Crash: prejudice

Raekwon Strickland

September 30,2015

Diversity and Social Justice

Mr. Cassidy

    In the movie we watched called Crash it was so much stuff going on in the characters lives. Too many things to see everything the first time you watch it. But when we went back and saw certain parts I was mind boggled by how everything connected and worked out to bring the story back around full circle. But the things I did see were the stereotypes presented by the characters. Such as the two young black men in the beginning coming out of the restaurant. Ludacris one of the men was complaining about how unfair the world is and how blacks should have equal rights. When he saw the white woman start to hold her husband when she saw them he acted as if he felt offended and told his buddy they should be scared because they were the minority in this situation. And then yet they carried out the stereotype and did exactly what the woman thought they would do and that's rob them. I felt this was important because people do this all the time. We complain about how unfair stereotypes about us are and how they prejudge us and you know we do, we fulfill those stereotypes. There were also racial stereotypes when the same woman that held her husband when the blacks robbed them was racist when the hispanic came to change their locks she wanted to get them changed immediately because she said that he would sell the keys to his “gangbanger homies”. This was another instance of stereotypical thinking.

    Racial tension was seen when the cop needed insurance for his father. The lady couldn't give his father an insurance claim and he attacked her identity. He asked for her name and she said “ Shaniqua” and he came back and said big surprise. He said this because he knew she was black because she couldn't give him the insurance. This showed racial tension because he used her name assume that she was a black woman. And because he was made upset by a black woman he automatically took it out on another black woman by sexually assaulting her. This showed the tension that he had with black people.

Well fear had a big thing to do with race. A good example is at the end of the movie when the cop killed the black man off of fear of what might happen. But it could have either race and fear or just based on pure fear of losing his own life. Many things could have happened it could have been a white man in his car and the same thing could ended in him killing him either way. So fear played a huge role in what happened no matter what race.

The in the movie was pretty serious resulting in mistakes that could have been made and resolutions to their problems. Such as the white woman who said she always felt angry. She was angry because she didn't have any true friends around her. The only person she believed was her true friend was the woman that took care of her and cleaned her house who just happened to hispanic. This opened her mind to anyone that isn't white to just give them a chance and get to know them as a person.