Is it racist to have minorities-only institutions?  Is it wrong to divide the population by race, gender or religious beliefs? I think in a way it can be.

We as a race put these restrictions on ourselves so that we only interact with our kind. At an earlier time, this might have been a good strategy to protect against racism and bigoted behavior from other races. Yet now that we live in a world that is a little more accepting, this restriction can hinder our progress.

Notice that I said “a little more accepting.”  Things are still not perfect, and the need for minority groups is still there only because we are not understood and respected enough to get a balanced representation from people of other races.

I think that minority clubs and organizations should break the stereotypes built around us by the mainstream. As it is, I can see how hyper-specific clubs can seem like a rehashing of old times where segregation was the norm.

Instead of separation being the name of the game, however, we should make these kinds of clubs into statements about how we have moved past our negative history and have become a people that is not the same as what we were made out to be.

Minority organizations are beacons that bring people that might feel alone in the world, that feel different, together so that  we can show mainstream society that we don’t act and look like the riffraff that’s praised on TV. We are a diverse group of people with many facets that need to be highlighted instead of hidden to make categorizing easier.

We should invite people of different backgrounds into these clubs and institutions as a way of educating the world about our culture and lifestyles.

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