Let’s talk about discrimination

Discrimination has been around just about as long as humans.  People are always looking down on someone who is different than them in some way, just as most likely they have looked at someone else with jealousy.  In a recent lecture, one of my professors brought up the portrayal of minorities in the media and it sparked a long chain of thoughts.
Why is it that a person's ethnicity plays such a huge role in their life?  To some people of ethnic backgrounds other than white, their culture is not even really that existent.  I am half Korean, half white — Hungarian, if we're being technical — and really until I came to Gonzaga I didn't feel like a minority.  All of my friends were predominantly white or black, and no one ever felt the need to point out that we were colored differently from one another. 

As a new student at Gonzaga, I expanded my social horizons and one weekend encountered this question:  What kind of Asian do you speak?  Needless to say I was horrified at this question, and whoever says there are no stupid questions obviously never heard this one.  I answered back that I didn't actually speak any ‘Asian,' but I knew the bare minimums of the Korean language. 

From then on, people who have asked about my heritage have seemed discontent, and even a little disappointed, when they realize that although I might not look white, I don't really fit any stereotypes that they would like me to, nor do I really know that much about my ancestry. 

For minorities, their involvement in their indigenous culture hits multiple points of the spectrum.  There are some who bleed for their home country, and those who consider themselves part of the general population of America.  What I have always wondered though, is why someone's ethnicity is such a big deal?  Does it really affect the kind of person they are, or what they should be entitled to do and say?  Are white Americans really longing to go back to '50s-style living where every character on television was white, and anyone who wasn't white had to fit some sort of media-embellished stereotype? 
In the media, minorities are poorly represented, and I question if poor ratings are due to people being uncomfortable with a non-white family.  Dating back to when sitcoms became popular, the people in television shows have been predominantly white, save for the Cosbys.  With the invention of Star Trek, a few actors of minority descent were picked for predominant roles, but they were either aliens or they didn't have speaking lines.  Now in 2010, there are a few shows that star African Americans, but they are aired at low-viewership hours. 

The students here at Gonzaga are bright individuals who worked hard to be here, but most likely the majority of us come from relatively affluent communities with little diversity.  The University itself has been trying to increase its numbers concerning students of ethnic backgrounds.  But in order to truly make Gonzaga succeed as a diverse school, it is absolutely necessary for everyone to desire to learn about other cultures and ethnicities.  Through clubs and organizations on campus, it is easy for students to learn about the various backgrounds that our minority students come from, and it's an invaluable experience to learn as much about these cultures as we can. 

It is by learning about other cultures that we can truly identify ourselves and make fair judgments about the world around us.  After all, if we were to remove our skin, we're all the same.