- = Racism = -

Racism is the belief that a particular race is superior or inferior to

another, that a person’s social and moral traits are predetermined by his or her inborn biological characteristics. It is also a racial prejudice that has been incorporated into the activities and procedures of major institutions, corporations, social systems (such as those related to housing, education, and health), and other arenas of major social activity (such as politics, the media, finance, and banking).

Prejudice and racism are about real power, they're not just something that is in people's heads. Social issues like prejudice are complex and operate at many levels. Some examples of racism are obvious, such as graffiti, intimidation or physical violence. Other forms of racism are not obvious, such as discrimination in hiring and apartment rentals, or policies that disadvantage members of certain races, whether intentionally or not.

The whole racism exists at three main levels: individual, institutional and cultural.

Individual racism takes the form of individual attitudes, beliefs, values and behaviours.

Racial prejudice, bigotry, belittling and jealousy are examples of racist
attitudes. Examples of racist beliefs are racial stereotypes, the belief that
some races are better than others and even the belief that people can be classified according to race in the first place. Violence, name-calling and discrimination in hiring are examples of racist behaviour.

Institutional or systemic racism takes the form of the practices, customs,

rules and standards of organizations, including governments, that disadvantage people because of their race, color or ethnicity. They do not always involve differences in treatment. For example educational requirements that are not related to actual job duties .

Cultural racism are the cultural values and standards that disadvantage

people because of their race, color or ethnicity. Examples are cultural expectations as to the race of a company president and the cultural standard for what a beautiful, trustworthy or competent person looks like.

An understanding of the nature of racism is essential in order to recognise and counter it successfully. It takes different forms in different contexts and as a result has been defined in many different ways.
Some psychologists think that the main cause of racism is that people define real world in terms of competition. Other claim that racism is influenced by a range of historical, social, political and economic factors. But to my mind, the main reasons are individual views and even character traits, as I strongly believe, that a normal,wise, independent and healthy in all the meanings of this word person would never be a racist!
I mentioned health as there are some psychological disorders, that may cause racism - one of them is xenophobia, due to wich people become afraid of foreigners and strangers or of their politics and culture.

But in most cases I can understand racism just as smb's own inside agression, that some weak and craven people just aren't able to let out in another form - on their own. And so they gather into groups and start to believ, that they are hating some race not for themselves, but for their country and their nation!
But whatever it's reasons would be - it is definetly destructive. It disempowers people by devaluing their identity. And maybe it is actually even better when people "fight" group versus group, than if it would be the same agression but versus some single humanbeeing, as in such case no one person from each side at least feels alone, helpless and the only one beeing hurt...