A Colorblind Society, Revisited

I have received a number of comments about my post "A Colorblind Society" from 10 August 2010. People disagreeing with me, saying it's important to keep a sense various ethnicities and backgrounds. And they're right. I'm not sure if it's a matter of me not saying what I meant to say in the first post, or if I just hadn't thought of it that way before, but I agree with you all. "Colorblind" maybe isn't the word I should have used. I wasn't trying to say that everyone should be the same, or assume that everyone is the same as them. What a boring world that would lead to. We should be aware of the differences in who we are and where we come from. It is what makes the world the rich tapestry of human lives it should be. To use a terribly elementary and cliche metaphor, we should aim to be a salad bowl, rather than a melting pot; a place where different ingredients come together to create a well-complemented whole, rather than melting into one big glob of unidentified mush. It's okay if the carrots stain the radishes a little orange, or the dressing soaks into the croutons a bit along the way. But if it becomes one big, wilted, soggy mess, and no one knows who they are or what they started out as, well, that doesn't create a very satisfactory meal, now does it?

I don't want my godson to think that black people or asians should be exactly like him, at least not in the way they act or talk or any sort of physical or outward manifestation of who they are. I just want him to know that inside, they are the same as him, in that they dream and love and think and feel. And if that Mexican immigrant's English isn't perfect, or that Brit's teeth are a little crooked, it doesn't mean they're any less of a person. I want him to be able to see things from outside his own point of view, so he can understand that his way isn't the only right way, and just because someone does something differently, it doesn't mean they're a worse or less sophisticated person.

I guess I just want him to transcend the ignorance that causes so many misunderstandings and so much unnecessary pain in this world: the ignorance that all of us fall prey to on occasion, myself included. Sometimes it just seems like we have so far to go. Will we ever make it? But at the same time, I have to believe we will. It gives me hope and the will to live, trying to make the world a little bit better every day. (I just realized what a Jewish concept that is...making heaven (perfection) on earth. Interesting.) I like to think there's a heaven, but the truth is I have no idea what awaits me after death. So for now, it seems to me that the best use of my time is trying to make things better here in this world. And if there is something after this, then I hope whoever is in charge up there will approve of my humble attempts at improvement, both of the self and the world.