Mixed Feelings Over Mixed Race

©2017 Michael Huber, Mark Thayer, Carli Buono, Joseph Carosi

 

BRISTOL, RI– As the snow is lightly falling in March, a day after a 50 degree afternoon on the Roger Williams University campus, it shows that 2017 is a year of drastic change in the U.S., as well as the world. And the fact the campus is now covered in white accents that point.

With Donald Trump’s Inauguration a seemingly distant memory after the tumultuous term he started, we have seen a drastic increase in the amount of hate crimes, anti semitism, Islamophobia, and a general distrust and oppression of anyone who is the “other” in society. And for all of the outcry from the public, the White House’s responses have been delayed for days and even weeks after the actual events, and have done nothing to truly diminish these crimes, as was shown by the attack of another Jewish cemetery, and over 13 bomb threats to Jewish community centers within days of his address to Congress.

Multiracial and mixed members of society have always endured constant scrutiny by the members of the groups they are a part of, as well as the groups that seek to single them out, and that seems to be accelerating at an alarming rate. Attacks on biracial Latino, Black, Arabic, and many other people, ranging from children in the school yard calling them “un american” because of Trump’s campaign rhetoric; to two Indian engineers in Kansas being shot, one fatally, by a man who thought they were Muslims, screaming “Get out of my country.” It appears that anyone with dark skin has no place in many parts of the United States.

Professor Autumn Quezada de Tavarez, herself a biracial woman who has experienced racism first hand, sees that America as a whole needs immigrants, refugees, and people of all creeds and ethnicities.

“I think the thing that makes America so beautiful and diverse is the fact that we have people from all over the world the live here.”

Law enforcement often has a different view on the matter. They see that profiling is a necessary aspect of the job. Richard Ferruccio, who is President of the Rhode Island Brotherhood of Correctional Officers, says that officers, “need to determine whether it was worth the negative impact on that group” when profiling someone.

It is true that tensions against racial and ethnic minorities are at levels that seemingly baffle many Americans given that the last President, Barack Obama, was the first African-American president in U.S history, and who tried to bridge ethnic divides throughout the course of his term. But like the rapidly changing New England climate, it seems harder and harder to understand the way the winds are blowing from on day to the next.

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