How the World Should Work

Sometimes reality is harsh.

I think we all know this. Every day we read about things going on in the world that can make one’s blood boil. Yet, despite how much we all care about fixing these things, they continue to happen.

Recently, we’ve seen the lens of our media focus on racism. Whether it’s a BLM rally, another death, or quote from the ole Reverend, racism is plastered all over our headlines.

Before reading on, I ask that you bear one thing in mind: this is reality I’m writing about here. Unfiltered, objective truth. So if you find yourself getting offended, try to consider the validity of what I’m trying to say and don’t take it personally. Because the last thing I want to do is offend. That’s never my intention.

This morning I read an article that spoke about the two hot topics I referenced in this post’s title. It mentioned Jennifer Lawrence’s passionate accusations of Hollywood that they unfairly pay men more than women. Then it mentioned that despite all the focus on race lately, Hollywood is still dominated by white males. They haven’t really budged to accommodate the complaints of the masses, resulting in a popular hash tag: #oscarsowhite. The article ended saying basically that Hollywood was a bunch of hypocrites.

Let’s take a moment and really, truly think about this. Personally, I like solving problems. One of the first things I generally do when solving a problem is to find out why it exists to begin with.

So, why does Hollywood favor white males when it comes to pay, casting, and general dealings? Well, in my humble opinion, the answer can be discerned using basic common sense: because its controlled by white males.

Now, let’s take this analogy and apply it to the bigger picture. Why do so many businesses, our government, and pretty much any massive institution favor white males?

Because they started them. Yes. White dudes created them. It really is that simple.

Let me call a quick time out to say that I hope you aren’t taking this the wrong way. I’m not saying it’s okay for these people to discriminate. What I am saying, however, is that this type of favoritism is wired into our genes. Whether we want to admit it or not, it’s a harsh truth that we favor people that resemble us. Whether that’s race, opinion, socio-economic status, it matters not. We tend to gravitate toward people who are similar to us. This isn’t exclusive to white people, mind you. After all, there’s literally a TV station dedicated to black entertainment, so I probably don’t even need to point that out.

Now that I’ve added that disclaimer, halftime is over. Game back on.

Back to my earlier point: most of our institutions are controlled by white men. So how do we overcome this prejudice and cronyism where they favor other white men?

Well, so far the only answer the media has shown us is people complaining, blocking traffic, and doing other completely counter-productive things (but that’s a whole other topic). If you ask me, the real solution is simple. We should create our own institutions. Yep. That’s right.

You see, I doubt that we, as a species, will ever truly transcend this petty characteristic of favoritism that seems to be written into our genome. So rather than spend our energy trying to change the existing status quo, we should instead use our creativity to generate a new status quo. If people are complaining because currently white males have all the power, the answer should be easy: take that power back.

That’s really the only productive way to combat institutional racism, sexism, and the like. At least in my opinion. We need to stop whining and instead get up and create, create, create. Start businesses, write books, create movie studios, do something meaningful where you have control of who gets casted or who gets to do what. Because as mad as this might make some people, the current solutions are doing nothing but creating even more racism. They might turn a head here or there, but overall it’s just not working. And that’s not good.

Its going to take a LOT of work, yes. And it won’t happen overnight. But we need to start creating our own reality.

Racism/sexism sucks. I think we pretty much all agree on that. But we really do need to take a step back and figure out the root of the problem before charging in and pointing fingers.

One last thing. If we ever DO succeed in doing this – creating a culture where white males aren’t the sole controlling demographic; I hope we put our money where our mouths are and stamp out the discrimination. Because if we don’t, that would just make us a bunch of hypocrites.

Just sayin.