Wednesday, August 3, 2022

Which half

His mother was from Brazil, his father from the state of Minnesota in the U.S. He spent time in both, has relatives in both, likes both soccer and football, feels at home in both (though currently living here in the U.S.).

In an America obsessed these days with identity, he wonders who he is. He looks like a white male, “arguably the most privileged and simultaneously the most demonized group in America. As a result of this, I am considered implicitly and irredeemably racist. I am both a beneficiary and an abettor of white privilege. I am at the very top of the oppressor . . scale."

Or maybe he's Latino or Hispanic. When he applied to medical school, should he have used  modern terms to claim membership in an "under-represented minority" to get some kind of advantage? 

It just didn't occur to him. He's always believed that "all people are of equal worth, regardless of their sex, race, gender, or other immutable characteristics." That's how he was brought up, and how he raises his own kids. 

People should not be judged on characteristics of their birth.

from his story at FAIRforall

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