What is racism? Webster’s Dictionary defines it as a belief or doctrine that inherent differences among the various human races determine cultural or individual achievement, usually involving the idea that one’s own race is superior and has the right to rule others. That idea may seem a little complicated to some, so I ask “What is racism to you?”

Racism to me is more than the believed idea of hatred between skin tones; it happens between religious people and nationalities. And it happens everywhere on every continent in every country.

In Africa, thousands of people are being massacred in one of the worst genocides in history in the scorching heat of Darfur. We saw similar episodes in Rwanda during the 1990s. Hitler’s massacre of the Jews during World War II is probably one of the worst cases of racism known to man. The ongoing conflict between Israelis and Palestinians in the Middle East is not only over land but which race has rightful ownership over the land. Even America has seen its fair share; the civil war, the civil rights movements and now the six black students in Jena, Louisiana, dubbed the Jena Six.

I’m not going to explain what is going on in Louisiana because most of you know or have at least joined the numerous Facebook groups. And if you don’t, you should read a newspaper. For those of you who are informed, I ask all of you to take a look around at the students that sit next to you in class, eat near you in the student center and live down the hall or the street from you and question yourself: have I made prejudgments on these people because of their race, nationality or skin tone? Have I jeered at them for the way they talk, dress or live? Odds are, you have made some kind of prejudgment no matter whether you think you are racist or not.

Perhaps the way you were raised has caused you to have certain prejudices against these people. Perhaps a past experience has caused you pain in dealing with different races. It doesn’t matter who you are or where you came from, we are all a bit prejudiced, but it’s those who take that prejudice to another level and destroy the lives of people they don’t know based on the color of their skin that separate the extreme from the norm.

I know that Wisconsin is not Louisiana, but we are one nation, one in the same people. We have lived here as one free nation for over 200 years now. We are all Americans. We all believe in freedom and liberty. We all want success, and we all have dreams. To be racist against someone because of the color of their skin in America is the same as being racist to your Irish-German-Swedish neighbor next door. There are no distinct color lines in America anymore, only blind ignorance.

I ask those that seem to find themselves superior because of the color of their skin to take a look at their family tree. Perhaps you see some German, Italian or Bohemian; all those races in their purest forms have different skin tones. These diverse backgrounds and heritages are present among every American, but we are all just that, American.

It is up to those of us who can see past that ignorance and embrace our fellow American regardless of their skin color to make a difference in our own nation, for the sake of our own people. We can’t be one unified nation, an example of freedom and democracy to the rest of the world, if we do not provide justice for our own citizens.

I am asking that we write to the powers at-be, protest this deranged assumption that we are better because of our skin color and attempt to make a difference if not in our nation, at least on our own campus. Any one of the students you walk next to on the way to class could be suffering from a racist attack or their own blind ignorance. We are all brothers and sisters in this nation and it’s time we start acting like it..