Question answered by Verena Denk, Program Associate and European Youth Director at PTPI’s European Office
6. Discrimination is a prevalent topic within this book. Cite some examples that Deo experienced. Have you experienced any similar actions where you find you can relate?
When Deo was a little boy, he tried to understand what “Hutu” and “Tutsi” meant, but nobody really wanted to answer him. He repeated a definition of “Tutsi” he had heard, but his further scolded him “This is prejudice. Shut up! Who is teaching you this?” Deo discovered that it was quite difficult to distinguish Tutsi from Hutu. None of the stereotypes seemed to work. Regardless, Tutsis were slaughtered by Hutus and Hutus by Tutsis in Burundi and Rwanda a few years later. Deo managed to escape the genocide, but in New York, he also faced discrimination in different forms and from different groups of people. Among his co-workers in the store, he was discriminated against because of his poor English and his “weakness.” Since he was obviously poor and had a low social status, he was discriminated against by the clients he made deliveries to. Later as a student, he was threatened for being a Tutsi, apparently by Hutus.
Like New York City, Berlin is a multicultural city. Stereotypes, prejudice and discrimination are definitely present here. Only last week, I organized a workshop in a high school here in Berlin. When I asked the students about own experiences with discrimination, I was surprised about the great number of shocking stories they had to tell. In multicultural societies, the problems are probably more obvious. In more homogeneous societies, the problems might be more subtle. Nevertheless, discrimination occurs everywhere and in every age group because it is always possible to find people who are “different” from the majority. To fight discrimination, we can only start with ourselves, monitoring our own thoughts, words and deeds. When we have the chance, we should protect others from discrimination. In my opinion, the key is to think of differences as enriching and not as threatening. What a party if we managed to celebrate diversity!
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Tags: Global Book Club, Strength in What Remains, Tracy Kidder
Deo was introduced to discrimination early in his age when he was growing up in Burundi. For him both HUTU and TUTSI looked alike and he did not understand why and what is that people around him were making fuss about. He maintained this innocence in to his college days. Though his friends told him he is discriminated because he was a TUTSI, it did not change his feelings or personality, how he felt about people around him. He is lucky in that sense that he remained mentally unpolluted. Never thought of taking revenge or start discriminating.
Discrimination and prejudice, I feel are the two sides of the same coin. Unfortunately they exist in every culture, in every society in some form or the other. Sometimes it is overtly seen and lot of times it is subtle depending upon the intelligence or suffostication of the individuals who are showing discrimination; The question is are we humans,inherently born that way or are we taught about it later?
There is a lot in the human history, where people were discriminated against something or the other. In Africa indians were called ‘coolies’ by the ruling administration. In Indian society people are discriminated, non brahmins against brahmins, Hindus against non Hindus, Lower class against higher class. Lower class were deprived of higher education. At one time in the history women were not given allowed higher education etc and etc.
My question is why do we discriminate as a human race? I have thought about it all my life but have not found a satisfying answer. I have had the experience of being discriminated in my life. Deo also had similar question in his
head I suppose.
I totally agree with Verena Denk that fight against discrimination should start with ourselves. The world would be a better place.
In conclusion I want to mention the movie ‘ Color of Friendship’. That movie made a great impact on me. I loved it. I agree that differences are to be appreciated and should be a learning experience to all.
It takes all sort of different things to make this world. If every thing was just the same we would not know the difference but it might be quite boring!
It is difficult to watch a group of people be discriminated against. K.Saroja I agree with you in that I don’t understand why the human race discriminates. Maybe for social acceptance? Humans are known to be influenced by their peers, in addition humans cannot control what values they were taught growing up. Not that I am making excuses for the human race but it seems to be a vicious cycle. I wish we had the answers to such issues, it would make for a more peaceful world.