The Human Race by Ehab Hmz

We are all members of the human race.

Fundamentally speaking, racism’s main cure is knowledge and love.

It may be complicated for some of us to understand how an individual can have a racist attitude and hatred towards others. Here are a few explanations that I found about this phenomenon:

Several studies have shown that there is a key factor in every case behind acts of racism. Psychologists and sociologists have determined that fear is the first basic cause that pushes someone towards hatred and racism.

In terms of hatred, it is very human to have certain feelings towards things or people.  This feeling can be implemented in a good way. For instance, we can hate bad deeds, which can, therefore, be a motivation to do good. This feeling can also be used irrationally when it is directed to certain ethnic groups, races, religions or sexual orientations. That belief is mostly transmitted from parents to their children, or from an intolerant community. People may be an ignorant product of ignorant mechanism.

“People hate because they’re taught to hate, and they are simply the product of ignorant people who have been taught an ignorant belief” that’s how Jane Elliot, the American anti-racism activist, explained intolerance.

Racism is a common phenomenon that appears mostly in areas where there’s a variety of races and ethnicities. It is a result of a mixture of emotions and thoughts and can develop into forming a very violent individual. Dr. Renee Carr, a psychologist, explained that fear is a survival mechanism in our instincts, and whenever a human being feels threatened, they will automatically have inner beliefs that work to defend themselves.

Ignorance is the root of fear. We fear what we don’t know, and we assume that it may be a threat. Our survivalist instinct tells us to protect ourselves, and we do that forming prejudices and attacking when need be. It is a way to protect our ego and our superiority. Actually, it is the fear to be inferior and to be suppressed.

Now, this is a brief explanation, consisting of what I’ve found and read online. I am writing about this issue because Tunisia has recently made good improvements in-laws concerning racism. On October 9, 2018, the Tunisian parliament passed a law that criminalizes racism or any kind of discrimination. The punishment can be as high as three years in jail and a fifteen thousand dinars fine. This initiative was taken in order to eliminate any form of intolerance and violence.

 

 

This is just one example of the important work produced by YaLa’s citizen journalists, a program funded by the European Union’s Peacebuilding Initiative in order to enable young leaders from across the Middle East and North Africa to document and share their experiences of the region.