People will always disagree on things. Ask a group of people a question and you will almost always receive differing responses. It’s part of who we are, part of being human. But where this innate ability starts to become a problem is when it intrudes upon individuals’ ability to coexist and possess different opinions while still respecting the opinions of others. One of the ways Penn State attempts to combat this issue is by holding World in Conversation discussion groups in which individuals are given a general controversial or uncomfortable topic to discuss amongst themselves and express whatever feelings they have towards that topic in a judgement-free zone.
The conversation I attended focused on racial divides. The conversation began rather blandly, as we danced around minor racial issues and attempted to define race. Some of the students felt that language is more of a defining characteristic of race than skin color is, but I feel that both of those factors along with a few others based on economics and background shape my definition of race. Then, the conversation shifted to slightly more controversial topics. We began sharing our personal experiences and backgrounds, and how we think those may have shaped the friends we have back home and at Penn State. It was interesting to discover that students who came from a less diverse background tend to associate with whichever race they have grown up with, whereas students who have been exposed to more diversity at a younger age tend to associate with a variety of different people at Penn State. We began to see if we could discover any other extraneous factors that would influence a person’s decision to associate with a certain race, regardless of whether or not that person would be considered “racist”. From that discussion, we seemed to conclude that an individual feeling more comfortable associating with a specific race does not mean that the individual is racist. However, society typically deems these people as racist, which is why individuals feel they need to be careful of what they say in front of others: no one wants to offend a person of another race and be deemed a racist by his or her peers.
This was definitely a worthwhile discussion and an interesting part of my Penn State experience thus far. I never would have felt comfortable talking about race and its implications in society with a random group of other students if we didn’t have that opportunity to share our thoughts and opinions in a controlled, judgment-free zone. The discussion not only made me think of what I define race as, but it also encouraged me to think beyond typical lines drawn by society and cross those boundaries. For instance, at the end of the discussion each student had to share an idea with the group that the discussion had erected in their thoughts; my idea was whether or not gender plays a role in racial perceptions. I began to think, what if men are more biologically inclined to accept and associate with people of different races, while women are less likely to associate with various races simply because they tend to base initial perceptions of others off of appearances. Regardless, I believe the conversation was unique and thought provoking, and I would definitely consider attending another session in the future.