Competition Breeds Racism

Competition Breeds Racism

Chapter Four pours an illuminating light on competition regarding a people concentrated within the underclass. Capitalism has yet again, through this particular discourse, set the stage of a fatal future for those who are Mexican American. Competition breeds Racism. It seems that whenever new immigrants arrive in the United States or in this case, inhabiting a desired land within the country, there seems to be several steps taken before full on racism can be implemented followed by amalgamation of the people. First, the group has to pose a threat to dominant ideals and the dominant group’s culture. This tends to be established through large groups and settlements of those individuals who are considered the “invaders” of the land. Large groups pose a number of problems to dominant society, including what the dominant culture believes to be the complete destruction of their way of life. Also, large groups of new and settling individuals lack a stable base within social atmospheres, such as neighborhoods, which can be attributed to the increase of crime in overpopulated and densely packed communities. Within the reading for instance, the text points out that little thought or action was given to those of Mexican heritage in the beginning because they posed little to any real threat of the dominant culture’s livelihood. However, the book continues to stress that when competition for goods and services began to become an issue between the dominant group and the immigrant groups, racial discrimination in the form of public policy and laws, along with blatant racism, and institutionalized racism follows. Therefore, competition coupled with high rates of population not only instills the perception of limited resources, but also creates room for the development of negative stereotyping and prejudice, which leads to an all-out blockade of rights and civil liberties creating a race which systematically continues to constitute the lower-class.