Nothing's Changed

I believe that violence not only sends a message out to people on how to view themselves but as society as a whole views a certain type of person. Most of the violence that happened to the African Americans enforced the stereotype that they were weak and unequal. The lynchings and other hate crimes that took place showed how the African Americans could be easily “taken down” and couldn’t stick up for themselves. With the book Passing we talked about how Clare wanted to act white because society told her being black was wrong. People get their ideas of what they should be from what society thinks and violence’s shapes societies views. People often only care about societies views, which is why every girl today wants to look like Angelina Jolie. When society constantly tells you something is right you start to believe it. African Americans were only persecuted or ashamed of what they looked like because other people were wrong. Nobody would have cared about the color of their skin if those around them didn’t care so much. When I saw this prompt I immediately thought of my favorite show Law and Order SVU. This is a show that depicts the lives of detectives who work on sex crimes in New York City. I have seen almost every episode and in the vast majority of them the victims of the crime are women and the perpetrators are men. The rare ones that don’t have women as the victim have gay men or children as the victim. I have never seen an episode where a straight adult male has been the victim of rape. These types of crimes are similar to the lynchings in the fact that nothing comes out of them other than showing that one human has power of another. The show, which is played in today’s society, which is supposed to have gender equality, constantly shows women in a lesser role. By showing that women are physically “inferior” to men because they are often victims that can’t stand up for themselves, the TV show is reinforcing the idea that women are a lesser gender than men. This is the same way in which the Lynchings showed that African Americans were physically “inferior” to the white people. Although these are just simple little acts, they start the whole movement and change people’s way of thinking. If you constantly see something in front of you it sinks into your mind and your thinking is altered. Even if men for example have never committed a crime such as rape if they constantly see men on TV deriving pleasure from overpowering seemingly helpless women, their thinking will start to be altered to think of women as just pleasure objects they can overpower. There was actually an episode where a boy commits rape and his lawyers claim it is because he has seen so much porn depicting rape growing up that he figured that it was something natural. He said he had seen women say no so many times and men kept going that he thought that was a natural part of sex. As ridiculous as this seems his lawyer actually presented a valid argument and he was given a much lesser charge for the rape. Hate crimes and violence still occur today and changes the way people view themselves and how society views a certain group of people.

Who wants to pass?

Irene’s “passing” in the novel is extremely intriguing to me because she does it out of convenience, not out of belief that being white is superior to being black. When she thinks she is “discovered” for being black in a place that is meant for only white people she reflects on her feelings, “It wasn’t that she was ashamed of being a Negro, or even having declared it. It was the idea of getting ejected from any place.” (Larson, 19). Although I understand why Irene would want to “pass” and pretend to be white it seems extremely hypocritical to me. She talks to her friend Gertrude about wrong and foolish she thinks it is that Clare pretends to be white all the time. Although Irene is pretty open about her blackness, she is totally secretive about her homosexual feelings. To me at least she needs to pick a side, either be ahead of her time and accepting, or be quiet like everyone else and accept the norms of the time. I think my views probably are a little extreme as I am really liberal but I believe you should stand up for what you believe in! I don’t know what it is like to deal with a secret that big, or live during those times so maybe I can’t judge correctly but why wouldn’t Irene come up. Even though everyone thinks they can’t make a change, someone has to do it. Who knows Irene could have maybe started an acceptance in the black community. It seems to me they would be more accepting than the white community as they were both groups that were discriminated against. I wrote about in my essay how special needs advocates teamed up with civil rights activists to gain recognition for their causes. Even though these causes are thought of as minorities, if you pool together all the groups that are thought of being different you would actually make up the majority of people. I truly believe you shouldn’t try to fit in, you should be who you are which is what is frustrating about Irene’s passing not only as a white person but also a straight person, two things she is not.

Maybe I have been inconsiderate in taking into account Irene’s feelings. Although I clearly have very strong ideas, I live in a society that is much more accepting than Irene did. I somewhat do understand her motivations for wanting to fit in. I think this is clearly seen in the example of Clare’s passing. Even though she questions it, society has told her she is wrong her whole life and if you hear something enough you start to believe it. Black people were continuously told they were inferior and I could see why they would associate being white with being better, but who wants to be seen as greater by society if it is not who you truly are? I believe that all of Irene’s passing is brainwashing by society as it is clear that she is somewhat on the verge of “coming out”. Even though I know that Irene isn’t real and it’s just a book, things like her situation did actually happen. I feel really badly for all the people that lived during that time period and wish society would get to the point where no one thinks about race, or sexual orientation other than just the way someone is.

I actually looked more into the whole idea of passing because I wanted to see what some of the real life people looked like. I found out there was a woman named Ina Ray Hutton who was famous during the 50’s and was passing for white. I was genuinely shocked when I saw her picture; she looks whiter than I do! It actually kind of made me happy to think about the joke that she played on America. People worship celebrities so much and thinking about the amount of people that looked up to what they hated makes me laugh. She brings together all my ideas about trying to fit in as "passing" is similar to acting like a celebrity today and the parallels are all seen in this one example.

Ina in action!   http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=T3qS1ynyJss#!