The Color of Skin
Statement of Fact – The amount of Melanin in one’s skin has zero bearing on ability, intelligence, upbringing, personality, potential, or any other attribute that has been falsely linked to the color we see when we observe another person. PERIOD!!!
So let’s take a brief journey back in time to help explain why this issue is a factor in how we interact with one another today. 100,000 years ago, as our ancestors roamed stretches of the African plains where they were a distinctly tribal animal. They hunted, gathered, and lived in small groups, anywhere from 50 to 120 members of a tribe. As with any creature, survival was the key focus. Propagation was a close second, making certain the tribe would have longevity as a whole, passing on the genetic codes.
Finding food was of the utmost importance which led to developing a territory within which meat, roots, and seeds could be gathered for the group. Since the tribes were seasonally nomadic, moving from area to area was dependant on the availability of food plus the impact of varying weather patterns. During these times, tribes would encounter other groups looking to use the same area for their own survival. This interaction would often lead to conflict over perceived rights to specific land.
Humans are not unique since other creatures also have a desire to retain their hunting grounds. Many mammals and birds chase off other groups of their own species to protect a specific area. Wolves, lions, tigers, hyenas, chimpanzees, foxes, hawks, red-winged blackbirds, and a wide variety of other species are a part of this innate territorial behavior. These types of traits were discussed in Robert Ardrey’s 1966 book titled, The Territorial Imperative. At the time, Ardrey’s book was highly controversial since social scientists in general were convinced that humans had evolved beyond animal behavior. Researchers who were mired archaic thinking were aghast at the thought of our potential kinship to other territorial creatures.
The discussion of a territorial imperative has a direct correlation to our instinctual reaction to seeing people who look different from either ourselves or other members of our immediate tribe. We are hardwired to be wary of anyone who doesn’t fit within our preconceived notion of those who are familiar within the group. An unfamiliar person, at least in the days of our ancient ancestors, would be considered a potential threat to the safety of the tribe. This has led to Xenophobia, an innate fear of strangers or of anyone who doesn’t appear to fit within our tribe.
Tribalistic behavior can be found everywhere, from the nursery school playground to the workplace to the residents of an assisted living home. We humans seek a lifelong immersion into finding one’s place in any community. And in order to make our groups special, there is also a need to be at least somewhat exclusionary to form that tribal core. In almost all cases we are completely unaware of this tendency, for this behavior comes from a place in our brains called the Amygdala, where our instinctual emotions reside.
This unconscious fear of strangers and of the unknown is expressed in degrees with regard to our reactions, though it is something we all experience regardless of how open-minded we believe ourselves to be. This is a difficult admission for some of us, and I understand that resistance. The fear of the unfamiliar, the fear of someone who we don’t recognize as a part of our community usually elicits an immediate reaction. I see this in my observations of other people, but more importantly I recognize this in myself. Once that self-assessment has occurred, what happens next is of critical importance.
There are two very different paths that can be taken. The first is that a person can stay with that sense of fear, allowing it to envelop them. They can then justify the emotional reaction to a stranger in their midst and react based on that fear. This will inevitably lead to anger, more fear, confrontation, and in some severe cases, tragedy. We have read in the news about innocent children ringing the wrong doorbell and being killed based on the homeowner’s assumption and fear. An unwarranted death such as this may be an extreme example, but this emotionally driven reaction occurs hundreds of thousands of times a day to lesser degrees.
The second path is one I choose, which is to immediately recognize this irrational reaction and fear and then give myself a virtual slap in the face to come back to an understanding that this person I have instantly vilified is of zero threat and that my innate fear is completely off the mark. At that point I silently apologize to that person for my misguided assumption. Again, as I write so often, this is about remaining Mindful of how we interact with our environment and the people we encounter.
Coming back around to the topic at hand, the color of someone’s skin can elicit an immediate and irrationally negative reaction. If the circumstances are such that a member of a tribe is not expecting to see someone who looks different in a specific situation, they may make unwarranted assumptions. Another example could take place in an upscale neighborhood when a beat-up car enters a street, regardless of what the driver looks like. It’s the same thing. Most people will immediately observe that the car is different from the Bentleys and Porches sitting in the nearby driveways and make an unfounded judgement that the beat-up auto has no reason to be in that community.
We can only counter this reaction through self-analysis and remaining aware of those innate and mostly irrational reactions. Of course there are times to be wary, but the vast majority of our responses to fear are overblown and can more often than not lead to the creation of an unfortunate situation.
And lastly, for me to feel that an essay such as this is necessary, is crazy. We are all human beings living on a small blue marble, as the Appollo 17 astronauts called the Earth. That most people continue to feel compelled to give into their baser nature at a time in our mutual history where this kind of tribalism is both self-destructive and completely devoid of rational thinking, is beyond comprehension. I just don’t get it.
First I want to thank Tobin for another provocative article. This particular subject has puzzled me since I was a young lad. Back in the day, especially at night, if I was walking down a street and noticed a large black or white fellow walking towards me, I would often cross the street and continue on. Thinking back, I did not consider this to be unusual behavior, just cautionary and often an automatic response.
I do not consider myself a coward by any means, but it seems to me that our inherent desire for self protection, be it unconscious or overt does serve a purpose.
That being said, I do understand how this way of thinking can become over reactive, especially when we live in a society that has become more exclusive over the years. I will always be aware of my surroundings, it’s called situational awareness. In the military its pounded into our heads that we must always have this mindset or risk harm to ourselves or those we serve with. However, taken to extremes, would become detrimental to and suppress our interaction with society and those we live with.
Lastly, the programming we receive on a daily basis from the government, the media, corporations, ads, and the input from the general population has, in my opinion, a profound influence on our perception of the world around us. The present administration, as many may agree, uses fear, intimidation and scare tactics in an attempt to drive us, like cattle, towards the dark side of human nature in order to control us. As Tobin states, if we can overcome this fear of “the other”, and realize it’s all just the illusion of fear, not actual that drives us, then there may be a chance we can overcome the dark shadow slowly creeping across societies around the world.
I would like to thank my brother, Carl, for his continuing engagement with regard to these essays. It’s exactly the kind of discussion I was hoping for when I started writing these.
In terms of your reply to this subject, I did not delve into the aspects of reasonable fear when being approached by someone unfamiliar because that seems like a separate subject. I am planning on writing at least one essay and perhaps more on the various fears we encounter, both real and imagined, at a later date.
I wrote about today’s subject specifically because I see those who want to divide us and then turn us against each other as extremely relevant to current society, not that most humans haven’t always had an issue with skin color. But it seems to be such a ridiculous thing and mostly I see it as an excuse to either attempt to feel superior or to be exclusionary. This kind of behavior has ZERO place in modern culture and just needs to go away.
Hello, Tobin —
I certainly agree with you. I’d like to enlarge your scope, as well. You’ve concentrated on the appearance of the “other.” If that were the only difference we react to negatively, it would be much easier to work on the problem. But so many factors contribute: culture, language/vocabulary/tone of voice, opinions, odors, content of conversation, etc. It’s a flood of stimuli. What a job we have to be mindful of all of them that cause us to make our judgments about other people!
Since our brains jump to conclusions that we should be aware of before we judge, then the question becomes how should we navigate this inundation of observations and stimuli? Which reactions should we bust through and ignore, and which ones use as legitimate guidance? Under what circumstances? Oof! Makes me tired to think of what our brains stand ready to do for us every day, all the time.
Hi Verna
Thanks as always for your input. I agree that preconceived notions can appear in many forms, most of them manifesting in an unconscious manner. The tone of our epidural layer seems to be the easiest to identify and is one that people react to from a distance. The others that you mentioned are generally more subtle in nature. But yes, we humans can find a wide variety of ridiculous reasons to denigrated others of our species including all of the differences you mentioned.
Staying alert and aware of our reactions is never easy, but I also firmly believe that if we want humanity to exist beyond another 100 years we’re going to need much better self-awareness. We simply cannot continue to have these attitudes if we want to move beyond this bottleneck of ignorance.
So in general, I agree with what you’ve written, but I guess I question the title and I’ll tell you why.
Since practically birth, Nicole grew up next to a family in Benicia that were African-American.. Since before she could walk, she was introduced to Rashida a child just her age. They grew up together, going back-and-forth to each other‘s house for probably 15 years.
So one day I took Nicole, who was probably 10 at the time to a friend of mine‘s work. We passed many people working there as we made our way to my friends office.
Later she asked me a question about one of the workers there and I had her describe who she was talking about so that I would know who it was.
She went on to describe what she was wearing and where she was at in the office. I really had no idea who she was talking about until she said it was the woman who was sitting at the front. She was talking about the receptionist. The receptionist who was African-American.
Not once did Nicole mention the color of her skin, which was confusing to me because it’s what most people say first. I knew at that point that Nicole was truly colorblind. And not in a negative way. It just didn’t enter her realm of description for her.
So to me it’s not the color of skin but the fear of something we’re not accustomed to which you state. To some it’s skin color. but to me a more accurate title would be the fear of the unknown.
Jennifer – your thoughts on this are, of course, correct. The neighborhood in Benicia was rare but not an anomaly since there are numerous places where people of varying ethnicities live and work in a harmonious environment. The “tribe” of the street where Nicole grew up included tribal members with various skin tones, as you noted. And yes, the basic premise of the essay was about the fear of the unfamiliar, but unfortunately the vast majority of humans in the world live in segregated environments where they are divided by skin tone and when someone who has greater or lesser melanin enters that tribal zone they are deemed to be invaders. The fact that there are neighborhoods such as the one in Benicia is much more the exception than the rule, although that is slowly changing.
The vast majority of people, if asked to describe a stranger they have seen, will begin with the color of their skin. It’s a part of both our training, the cultural isolation in which most of us grew up, and that innate fear of anything or anyone who is unfamiliar. I’m not saying that it is the only aspect of someone else when it comes to categorizing those around us, but it is the single thing that is most prevalent. Unfortunately!