Race: The Power of Illusion

In the short film that we watched in class the film expressed that people do not really know how to define race. People may think that race is just who someone is because of how they look. Everyone tends to notice how people look before they think anything else of them. In the movie the narrator quoted, “we notice appearance before anything” because that is how people judge others.
Race is really defined as the laws and practices in different cultures. Immigrants have to fit in a society based on race because they are not seen as the “typical” American. Immigrants come to America to seek freedom, work, and a future for themselves and for their family. Most of the Immigrants that came to America were from eastern and southern Europe. When they came here it was said that, “58% were miners.” People say that “biology is destiny” because years ago what race you were determined your status and how you lived your life. The black people were seen as lazy and stupid, the Jews were of the lower class, and the whites were the privileged ones. Lynchings were very common during a certain period of years and black people were not the only ones getting lynched. The narrator talked about a Jewish man being lynched for supposedly killing a white woman. Whiteness was also a key to citizenship. Also after the war blacks got the right to vote but the majority of voters and juries were predominately white so the black people really did not have much say in the government.
In the film it stated that different states had different definitions of what qualified people for being black and white. For example one state had a law saying a person was considered black if they had at least 1/8 of African American heritage in their background and other states had somewhat similar laws. Why would states have such rules? Why did people not realize what they were doing? In the past it was all about race and what race you were determined your future. Today race is not an issue but has other problems associated with it. People do not realize what is going on until their culture or race is affected and someone gets laws changed to make a difference.
I thought the film was different in a way. Although it was a review of issues we have already discussed in class it was interesting to watch.