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I am seeing an increasing trend where many online bloggers are helping and linking mostly to bloggers from their own ethnic background only. This is probably a trait carried on from the offline world, where one prefers and gives better treatment to people depending on their ethnic background. By ethnic background, I am referring solely to the ethnic background of a person, and no other connection.

The blogs in question could be about any topic, but a person, or you, may prefer linking or reading them simply because the blogger in question is of the same ethnicity as yourself, and not because of the topic in question. In the process of doing so, a person is deliberately ignoring people from other ethnicities, simply because they are from a different ethnic background.

Is your favorite blogger giving preferential treatment based on ethnic backgrounds?

Check out majority of the top blogs on the internet today, including all the ones you visit each and every single day. Check out this very site too, and check out your sites too if you have one. If many of the top blogs do not usually link to each other based on the amount of income one makes, then many of those blogs prefer linking to each other based on their ethnic background affiliations. Do you also notice such a trend?

Some people can mix ethnicity to country affiliations too. Americans preferring American bloggers, Australians preferring Australian bloggers, Brazilians preferring Brazilian bloggers, Canadians preferring Canadian bloggers, Chinese preferring Chinese bloggers, French preferring French bloggers, Indians preferring Indian bloggers, Japanese preferring Japanese bloggers, Mexicans preferring Mexican bloggers, Vietnamese preferring Vietnamese bloggers, and so on. Instead of using the internet to be more equal and to do away with racial and ethnic differences, we are using the internet to increase the awareness of such socially constructed differences even more.

A brief view of a brief summary my view on ethnic backgrounds and affiliations

The topic of how much I dislike ethnic affiliations requires a book of its own. I personally oppose any idea of preferential treatment based on ethnic identities. I consider everyone, including myself, to be equal unless and until someone brings me back to my senses by asking me about my ethnic background and by making me realize how different or same of a human being I may be in the eyes of others. For me, ethnic identification is just a stereotype, since every human being is unique and has her or his own abilities that may be similar to the abilities of other people.

I dislike talking about my ethnic background, since in my view talking about such a thing does nothing but give others better ways to stereotype. I am me; judge me, if you must, based on how I act and based on how I think and based on what I feel, and not based on how some specific group out there may act or think or feel. “You are from Japan? No wonder you like sushi. You are of African decent? No wonder you like rap music. You are American? No wonder you support any and all wars. You are European or Middle Eastern? No wonder you oppose any and all wars. You from the same ethnic background as me? We are good friends already! You have the same ethnicity as me? I will treat you better, and you should treat me better too.” All pure rubbish views, in my view, because they are derived solely from stereotypes based on ethnic generalities and assumptions. I do not care what your ethnicity is. All I care is how you have and will act around me and others, and towards me, others and yourself, and why. Thats is it. Nothing else matters to me when it comes to me respecting you. Absolutely nothing.

Do you prefer linking to, or reading things by bloggers who are of the same ethnic background as yourself?

What do you think? Do you support the idea of linking to or reading blogs written by bloggers from the same ethnic background?

Please let me know what you think. Thank you.

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Racial discrimination

Theoretically on the web, there should not be any form of discrimination. In reality however, there is. We use the same racial terminology to describe people on the web that we do in person. On sites like MySpace and Facebook, I see many people sticking around and joining groups that promote their culture only by degrading other cultures. The potential of the web is being wasted in creating more separation than what the web is actually capable of: bringing everyone closer than never before. Similarly, we ask people about their ethnic race and background culture even when it comes to things like creating some e-mail account or joining certain blogging networks. We need to realize the situations where such information is beneficial to everyone, and we also need to realize the situations where such information is not relevant.

It is easy to get a chance to appreciate others online for what they do for themselves and for what they do for others. Even when we see pictures of millions of people on their own sites, we do not rush to conclusions based on their biological appearance. Instead, we associate the writing with the picture and that association creates a completely new perspective in our minds. Such interaction with others on the web will help us phase out any stereotypes we have related to different people online.

Gender discrimination

One of the other obvious forms of discrimination today is against females. In real life, many people get surprised when a female accomplishes great things in a male dominated world. We still get surprised and show anger at the very thought of a woman running a country, regardless of her political affiliation. Similary, in the corporate world we still throw tantrums in real life and online when a female runs a big corporation, creating extra fuss simply because of her gender. We have a way to get over this on the web but many choose not to.

The same way there are stereotypes against people of a specific gender in the world of shopping, stereotypical discrimination exists on the web also. Many people will still only link to sites of the same gender, because they “don’t trust” the opposite gender. I wonder if they follow this same rule when it comes to their parents, siblings and children? While everyone is entitled to their opinion, we have more chances to look at sites without wondering about the identification differences that the societies in the world have created. The online world allows everyone to have equal opportunities, regardless of their gender. Let us make use of these opportunities to at least remove discrimination from our own mentality.

Conclusion: The web allows us to progress against discrimination

While discrimination usually amounts to promoting a certain biological trait over another, sometimes promoting such traits effectively as a reactionary countermeasure helps people be aware of discrimination. Blogging sites focusing solely on a certain gender can be an example of this. While they all may be considered promoting a certain gender over the other, some of them actually take the right step when it comes to raising more awareness about something that has been suppressed for centuries: realization that everyone is equal regardless of their gender. Similarly, there are many sites which promote blogs by a certain country or a certain ethnic group. Joining these groups is fine as long as you do not put any other country or ethnic group below your own. You do not own rights to a certain group of people, and therefore you certainly not own rights to degrade any group of people.

I look forward to the day when people would feel comfortable doing things both in real life and on the web regardless of their gender or race. I also look forward to the day when different people will do different things together while still getting together with people of similar traits if they wish. I hope this is done in an effective manner so that everyone is treated equally, and that sticking close to people of different races and both genders makes us realize that we are all equal. One day people will hopefully tell each other “Back then they used to treat people of different races and gender differently.” I hope I see that day in my lifetime.

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It reminded me of all the times I applied for work at different restaurants when I was young [about a 100 years ago], and how many times I got the job, and many times I didn’t. Somehow I remembered the Abercrombie & Fitch lawsuit, in which the giant clothing retailer was found to have business practices that were deemed “unethical” and supporting discrimination against different minorities in the country, and also against women applicants. Discrimination against the minority does keep happening throughout the country, there is no doubt about that. However, there is one thing that many people don’t notice; discrimination originating not only from the majority, but also from the minority.

There are many restaurants, regardless of their background or ethnicity of the owners, or even the restaurant type, that offer jobs to and employ everyone who is qualified because of their skills. In this short article, I am going to talk about those restaurants in the minority areas that do not wish to employ those people who are from different ethnicity, or are of a different gender than the dominant gender in the society [you can imagine which gender is which]. I remembered how people were really hyped up last year when the issue about Abercrombie & Fitch was in the mainstream news. Similarly, Walmart has been targeted for years for discriminating against women job applicants and workers. However, I don’t remember seeing anywhere in the news about what happens to applicants who, being either from the minority or the majority communities, apply at a place that is owned by a minority community member. For example, have you ever seen an American guy working at a Japanese restaurant? Or have you ever seen any African American working at a Chinese restaurant? In the example above, I have never seen any other ethnicity, other than Vietnamese people, working at Lee’s Sandwiches.

While these cases may not be obvious at first, I’m surprised that people haven’t sued these small chains for discriminating others also. You can try this yourself; go to a restaurant or a food chain, or even a grocery store, that is accepting applications in a minority area which you don’t belong to [technically], and try applying. When your face looks different from everyone else around you, including the workers, you can see the small surprise in the face of the employer to whom you hand over your job application to. I once applied at a Japanese restaurant in Tustin, as a waiter, when I was still young. The closest I got to the job at that place was when I had the job application in my hand, and when I handed it over to one of the amazed employees. I never got any call, and the position was filled up after a month of being open by a native Japanese citizen. How many of you have been to a boba place in America and seen someone who doesn’t fit the typical stereotype working there? Have you ever succeeded in getting a job there if you don’t fall into that stereotype? How about a Del Taco; how would you react if the place was filled, in Southern California, with all Caucasian Americans and not Hispanic-origin people?

The only non-stereotypical person I see at most of the boba places are Mexicans, who work in the back making and cleaning the boba. They never come to the front; the front is reserved for different kind of people. Similarly, have you ever counted the number of female waitresses working at a Japanese restaurant, and the number of male waiters at the same restaurant? Figure out the ratio, and find out the same ratio at different Japanese restaurants, specially those that are open till night and have bars that attract males. You will be surprised at the closeness of those ratios. Same is the case with many different ethnic restaurants in different situations and scenarios. Not all places are like this; I worked, while I was in school and during the early years of college, at a few Chinese restaurants, and while I didn’t stay there for long, the owners of those places at that time simply didn’t care if I was from Mars or from hell, as long as I gave the customers what they wanted. They treated me normally, and I treated them normally.

However, it is getting harder and harder to see diversity among the minority establishments. While such a theme may be called valid and as “offsetting” the entire balance as there are less minority workers than majority and thus they should be preferred, this whole system of “preference” is discrimination to me in many cases, as not preferring someone for a job or any other benefit, while that person has done no wrong but is being categorized into the “stereotypical” practices of the few of the majority, is discrimination against that individual. Language is sometimes used as a scapegoat to eliminate someone from a job opportunity. Language should not be a barrier. In North America, for example, English should be only required in jobs at public places that don’t depend on language. Restaurants shouldn’t depend on languages, but places like translation services should. So, a restaurant that has customers that speak different languages, should hire both types of people; those who speak only English, and those who speak another language in addition to English, so that when someone is needed to speak a foreign language to a customer who doesn’t speak English, the one who speaks that other language can be assigned to that customer.

These small situations of discrimination, which lead to filtering out anyone who doesn’t look a certain way, should be kept in mind when dealing with discrimination on any level by the majority, in any country. We have to be an example of what we want others to be; a society is a machine, aiming to be an ideal society where everyone is equal regardless of where they are from. All the parts of the machine have to work together. This requires a friction-less mechanism; discrimination is the friction here, which keeps slowing down this machine. We are not an ideal society today; we are far from such a thing. Focusing on the fast food and restaurant industry alone, we have many restaurants with two kinds of menus; one for a certain language, and another for the mainstream majority language speakers. This is discrimination, as both menus have the exact same pricing but many different items that are not available to both of the language speakers.

While we may point out the invisibility of diversity at places like Ruby’s, we often don’t look for such trends at places that are not so glamorous. We have many bakeries throughout the country, located in minority areas, which only offer signs in a specific language other than what the majority speaks, so that anyone who speaks the main majority language has a hard time adjusting and finding out the prices, let alone order anything. How can we call a huge corporation a “racist” organization and label it as being “white”, when we ourselves don’t let any other ethnicity join our local banks [like banks aimed at Vietnamese population only in major cities in California], restaurants, small coffee and boba shops, and other places? We should allow everyone to come in and participate. Whether one is black, brown, yellow, pink, purple, orange, or blue, it doesn’t matter; we’re all red inside, and that is what makes us all the same. Once we ourselves, no matter which country or galaxy we’re from, treat others equally, we can expect to have the right to be treated equally also. Only then can we actually look at everyone else as a human being, and not as someone from a different community. I am also a human being, just like everyone else; if I am wrong in something I said, or I may be judging something incorrectly because of some incorrect information, please let me know.

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