Often times, it's hard for a lot of people (read: me) to articulate their opinions on race relations and the nature of racism. I've come across people that have told me that racism isn't inherently a flawed mental mindset, but rather a defense mechanism to aid in self preservation - basically, the "If you touch a hot stove once, you'll never do it again and save yourself from being burned in the future" argument. I've even had people tell me that negative characteristics are just a part of a certain race's culture or even embedded in their genetics.

I find it a rather lucky occurrence that, on my way home today from school today, my mother mentioned an article she was reading regarding the nature of racism itself. If you want to read the whole article, here's the online PDF: [link]

If you don't feel like reading the whole thing, here's one of the most interesting parts (in my opinion):

'Now I will use this image of the 2 flower
boxes to illustrate the 3 levels of racism. Let's
imagine a gardener who has 2 flower boxes,
one that she knows to be filled with rich, fertile
soil and another that she knows to be filled
with poor, rocky soil. This gardener has 2 packets
of seeds for the same type of flower. However,
the plants grown from one packet of seeds
will bear pink blossoms, while the plants grown
from the other packet of seeds will bear red
blossoms. The gardener prefers red over pink,
so she plants the red seed in the rich fertile soil
and the pink seed in the poor rocky soil. And
sure enough, what I witnessed in my own garden
comes to pass in this garden too. All of the
red flowers grow up and flourish, with the
fittest growing tall and strong and even the
weakest making it to a middling height. But in
the box with the poor rocky soil, things look
different. The weak among the pink seeds don't
even make it, and the strongest among them
grow only to a middling height.
In time the flowers in these 2 boxes go to
seed, dropping their progeny into the same soil
in which they were growing. The next year the
same thing happens, with the red flowers in
the rich soil growing full and vigorous and
strong, while the pink flowers in the poor soil
struggle to survive. And these flowers go to
seed. Year after year, the same thing happens.
Ten years later the gardener comes to survey
her garden. Gazing at the 2 boxes, she says, "I
was right to prefer red over pink! Look how
vibrant and beautiful the red flowers look, and
see how pitiful and scrawny the pink ones are."'

I just felt like this was something that needed to be shared. Thoughts?