My experience and my educational qualifications did not matter. Finally, I truly understood what prejudice felt like and it was a very sickening feeling. Each new rubber band changes the mass, density and dimension of the ball and how it will react to outside stimuli, just as the layers of culture change how we as humans react to situations. Until something happens to make you understand the other side, you do not realise what they must be going through. I am 58; I have seen the political and religious divide growing. What I see around me pains me. I believe military personnel grow to be more tolerant, especially of their peers and team mates. In most cases they are not evil; most of them are here because they have nowhere else to go. One of our promised rights and supposed bastions is freedom of religion and, unfortunately, it is often defined as freedom of MY religion. The racial divide is still obvious, though not predominantly. I know a lot of white privileged people who won’t take up certain jobs as they think it is beneath them.I have seen the country change. In 2015, a white supremacist shot and killed nine people in a predominantly black church in Charleston, South Carolina. That policy has since been replaced, following a public outcry, with one that detains entire families crossing the border illegally.There are socio-economic reasons as well for the bigotry and racism that we see around us. There is a lot of bigotry, prejudice and racism in other parts of the country as well. It has made me more aware of what it feels to be on the other side.Being legally blind, I have experienced prejudice first-hand. Nationalism and xenophobia are creating a downward spiral. Deep in my heart, I felt a sadness that I had never felt before. According to media reports, more than 2,300 children were separated from their parents after crossing the southern US border. Unfortunately, I think many people will always believe we don’t have anything to learn from other countries. There are many instances that prove it. The “us against them” mentality is spreading and is creating a hateful world.I am a soldier’s son, born in Germany and raised in the United States. I think we are going back to a situation where it is becoming socially acceptable to be racist, ugly and nasty to anyone who looks different.I live in rural Georgia, an area that is racially balanced.I remember my childhood; there was a lot of racial tension in the Sixties, but unlike previous decades, it wasn’t socially acceptable to be racist. I have served in the Army for 20 years and have been to places such as Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan.Are there countries that we can learn from? We keep hearing about unrest, racism and bigotry in most countries, but I don’t recall hearing or reading about such instances in Canada, the Scandinavian countries and Brazil. He saw my cane and made up his mind. South Carolina eventually decided to take down a Confederate flag that had flown at the state capitol for years, but that was met with protests from white racists.Extremes have taken over both sides of the political spectrum in my country.The world over, politicians are increasingly using words and fear to create a divide among people, much like they did in pre-World War II Germany.”No religion is superior or inferior to the other.In the US, you can see this mentality in the way immigrants are treated as well as in the current administration’s Zero Tolerance Border Policy. People tend to forget that and allow politicians to use religion to divide us.Each of us is in essence like a rubber band ball.I believe it is one of the many faults of human beings to be insecure and, as a result, pettiness, racism and bigotry are often used as a defence and often as a weapon to make others feel smaller or themselves bigger and stronger. Skin colour was not an issue. I was once at a job fair; the person didn’t even bother to look at my resume. Some rubber bands are wide and comforting; some are thin, tight and painful, with a variety of sizes in-between adding to the construction. The seeds of hate take a long time to go away; I think the country will take a long time to recover. In Charlottesville, Virginia, white supremacists opposed the city’s plan to take down Confederate monuments. Travelling the world working on humanitarian aid missions has given me the opportunity to engage with people of other cultures and understand them. Life has been rough for black Americans, and I believe it is even more difficult for foreigners of colour. I love culture and cultural differences. I have had advantages because I am white. I hope there is a moment of enlightenment when people realise that we cannot go down this path anymore. I can’t tell you why that is the case, or why these countries seem to be better at building bridges.

Being Wholesale Synthetic Rubber a parent as well as a grandparent, I also worry if the hatred and fear being spread will come back and hurt my family. It is something worth looking into though. I do not understand why some people look down on people of colour.Is there a way out? Unfortunately, there is no quick fix. There is so much that we can learn from others and I am sure many feel the same way. I think our current President saw it and was shrewd enough to take advantage of it. Culture is developed as if adding one rubber band after another. Education and communication will help, but how do we educate a large section of people who are blind to the truth?The author is faculty member in the Department of Communication, Columbus State University, Georgia, and advocate for people with disabilities end-of Tags: racism, prejudice, us border, religion, bigotry. When I was in the Army, we trained, fought, and relaxed.I would not like to comment on the merits of the policy, but I wish the country stopped treating immigrants as criminals. You cannot be a moderate in the middle, like I am. As an academic, I believe education creates an open mindset allowing people to see beyond race or ethnicity.I haven’t had a chance to read extensively about what is going on in India but from what little I know, it seems like fear mongering and hate rhetoric have become the tools most used to take control in the country and divide people. The situation in the US isn’t any different. Regardless of the religion we believe in, be it Christianity Judaism, Islam or Hinduism, we are all praising a supreme being, each having rules about living a good life and being kind to others like “Love thy neighbour