A Ninja Perspective on Racism

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I had an amusing experience on Friday as I was bringing my lunch – Chinese food from the place on the first floor – back up to my office. On the elevator ride up, the guy in the elevator commented, “Man, that smells good. Where ya delivering to?”

He had mistaken me for a delivery service, simply because I was an Asian guy carrying Chinese food.

What I found more interesting was the reaction of folks on Twitter when I made mention of the incident. Seems they were a lot more offended than I was.

Racism, whether explicit or implicit, is harmful, but from my perspective, it’s an important insight into a person, and a very public display of their weakness. Racism is a weakness, a character flaw that a skillful practitioner of ninjutsu can take advantage of. We have an expression – kyojitsu tenkan ho – which roughly translates as “truth as a lie, lie as truth”. Any character weakness can be turned against you, any preconceived notion about a person can be used to distract and divert your mind away from the reality of a situation, ultimately to your detriment.

In the case of this guy, his remarks told me that if I ever needed to infiltrate his office, say as a competitor to steal some confidential information off his computer network, I could show up with a bag of Chinese food and if I ran into him, he’d make a false assumption that I was working as a delivery boy.

If you find yourself the subject of false assumptions – blondes are airheads, blacks are criminals, Jews are stingy, anyone Muslim is a terrorist – ask how you can turn those assumptions to your advantage.

Comments

18 responses to “A Ninja Perspective on Racism”

December 10, 2007

Mitch Joel – Twist Image

Add in a slap of ignorance to the Racism… and that’s where things really brewed to a boiling point here.

It’s another case of Foot In Mouth disease along with a note as to to how far we’ve come as a society and how far we still need to go.

I’m not sure it’s a “weakness” as much as how we are brought up. It reminds me of that Sesame Street segment – we’re constantly trained how to notice what’s different. The tragedy comes when people start ranking those differences with everything not like them… below them.

Can’t we just pull some Ninja moves on people like that?

Great post and insights Ninja (as always).

Reply
December 10, 2007

Christopher S. Penn

We pull ninja moves on them all the time – I call it “certifying a loan” 😉

Reply
December 10, 2007

Raphaël

Yesterday, I watched a documentary about a former french police officer. When he wasn’t working, he usually spent time with friends of his, said friends being members of the “arab minorities”. As he is not white, he was often controlled by cops who would go talking to him like they would have to a dog until he showed his cop ID. He was fired from the police corps because he had an interview with a reporter, talking about “behind the curtain” in the police corps. If you understand french: http://regardeavue.com/index.php/2007/05/20/139-paroles-de-policiers
Or if you want to see the face of Jamel.

I am so xenophobia-phobe. :p

Reply
December 10, 2007

Whitney

This is interesting, because I think people always see what they want to see- we all look at every situation with our own set of glasses, our own experience. If you are grumpy, you see everything that happens as a slight towards you; if you assume people are basically good, things are much rosier day to day, but you can occasionally get taken in by those less optimistic about human nature.

I am always amazed and pleased at how my kids never see a difference the way adults do- it’s never “the hispanic kid”, it’s the “girl with kinda tan skin and dark hair” if we are trying to describe/identify someone, ie. “what’s the name of that girl on the field trip?” “Which One?”

I am hoping as time goes on, we’ll see less and less identification of people by “racial” lines. I hope we are entering a time where what you know and what you do are much more important that what you look like, what your religion is, and the like. But often, some of the cultural things associated with different groups do help inform an individual’s picture of the world and perceptions- it is education and exposure to people who are “other” that tells us very quickly that people are people, and the labels we place are just tags, providing a larger context and environment about someone.

In special education, parents are always worried about labels, and stigma- yet most kids would rather be able to say “I have dyslexia” that “I am Stupid”. And if we can’t provide kids with the context for their school struggles, they will provide their own labels and tags- things that won’t be as helpful and constructive.

Reply
December 10, 2007

Whitney

This is interesting, because I think people always see what they want to see- we all look at every situation with our own set of glasses, our own experience. If you are grumpy, you see everything that happens as a slight towards you; if you assume people are basically good, things are much rosier day to day, but you can occasionally get taken in by those less optimistic about human nature.

I am always amazed and pleased at how my kids never see a difference the way adults do- it’s never “the hispanic kid”, it’s the “girl with kinda tan skin and dark hair” if we are trying to describe/identify someone, ie. “what’s the name of that girl on the field trip?” “Which One?”

I am hoping as time goes on, we’ll see less and less identification of people by “racial” lines. I hope we are entering a time where what you know and what you do are much more important that what you look like, what your religion is, and the like. But often, some of the cultural things associated with different groups do help inform an individual’s picture of the world and perceptions- it is education and exposure to people who are “other” that tells us very quickly that people are people, and the labels we place are just tags, providing a larger context and environment about someone.

In special education, parents are always worried about labels, and stigma- yet most kids would rather be able to say “I have dyslexia” that “I am Stupid”. And if we can’t provide kids with the context for their school struggles, they will provide their own labels and tags- things that won’t be as helpful and constructive.

Reply
December 10, 2007

Leesa Barnes

Wow, this is odd. Yesterday, I was just thinking about an incident that happened to me in a laundry room about 9 years ago when I first moved into an apartment building in downtown Toronto.

I was folding my dried clothes when a woman walked in. She said hi, I returned the salutation and continued folding.

That’s when she asked: “Are you new to the building?”

I said yes. To which she asked: “Who do you work for?”

This incident happened in Canada, in a diverse city called Toronto in 1998.

(**sigh**)

Reply
December 10, 2007

Leesa Barnes

Wow, this is odd. Yesterday, I was just thinking about an incident that happened to me in a laundry room about 9 years ago when I first moved into an apartment building in downtown Toronto.

I was folding my dried clothes when a woman walked in. She said hi, I returned the salutation and continued folding.

That’s when she asked: “Are you new to the building?”

I said yes. To which she asked: “Who do you work for?”

This incident happened in Canada, in a diverse city called Toronto in 1998.

(**sigh**)

Reply
December 10, 2007

Mitch Joel – Twist Image

Add in a slap of ignorance to the Racism… and that’s where things really brewed to a boiling point here.

It’s another case of Foot In Mouth disease along with a note as to to how far we’ve come as a society and how far we still need to go.

I’m not sure it’s a “weakness” as much as how we are brought up. It reminds me of that Sesame Street segment – we’re constantly trained how to notice what’s different. The tragedy comes when people start ranking those differences with everything not like them… below them.

Can’t we just pull some Ninja moves on people like that?

Great post and insights Ninja (as always).

Reply
December 10, 2007

Christopher S. Penn

We pull ninja moves on them all the time – I call it “certifying a loan” 😉

Reply
December 10, 2007

raj

Yesterday, I watched a documentary about a former french police officer. When he wasn’t working, he usually spent time with friends of his, said friends being members of the “arab minorities”. As he is not white, he was often controlled by cops who would go talking to him like they would have to a dog until he showed his cop ID. He was fired from the police corps because he had an interview with a reporter, talking about “behind the curtain” in the police corps. If you understand french: http://regardeavue.com/index.php/2007/05/20/139-paroles-de-policiers
Or if you want to see the face of Jamel.

I am so xenophobia-phobe. :p

Reply
December 10, 2007

Christopher S. Penn

@Whitney: always give labels that are changeable. A friend of mine teaches women’s self defense and teaches that virtually everything should be viewed as an opinion, because opinions are malleable, e.g. “You’re stupid!” and the target of said abuse mentally appends, “In your opinion” so that they mentally delineate fact from opinion.

Reply
December 10, 2007

Christopher S. Penn

@Whitney: always give labels that are changeable. A friend of mine teaches women’s self defense and teaches that virtually everything should be viewed as an opinion, because opinions are malleable, e.g. “You’re stupid!” and the target of said abuse mentally appends, “In your opinion” so that they mentally delineate fact from opinion.

Reply
December 10, 2007

Chris Brogan…

What a story. Invisibility, in my perspective, because you’re just another person to be discounted, and like you said, that’s an advantage.

As a traveler, I ride in plenty of cabs. I love to engage in conversations, and what I find, OFTEN, is that cab drivers are more educated than me, have held positions I couldn’t hope to attain, and that the lion’s share of people getting in and out of their cabs discount them as someone lowly who could only get a job driving a cab. Nearly never the case.

I like that poinst about “in your opinion.” Within that is that amazing power to choose business that empowers all of us.

Great post, Chris.

Reply
December 10, 2007

Chris Brogan…

What a story. Invisibility, in my perspective, because you’re just another person to be discounted, and like you said, that’s an advantage.

As a traveler, I ride in plenty of cabs. I love to engage in conversations, and what I find, OFTEN, is that cab drivers are more educated than me, have held positions I couldn’t hope to attain, and that the lion’s share of people getting in and out of their cabs discount them as someone lowly who could only get a job driving a cab. Nearly never the case.

I like that poinst about “in your opinion.” Within that is that amazing power to choose business that empowers all of us.

Great post, Chris.

Reply
December 13, 2007

Dani

Racism is when the assumption made is used against you in a hateful or angry manner.

He was merely stereotyping. As we all do. Some are just more ignorant of their stereotyping than others.

But what do I know? I’m just a stay-at-home soccer mom! 😉

Reply
December 13, 2007

Dani

Racism is when the assumption made is used against you in a hateful or angry manner.

He was merely stereotyping. As we all do. Some are just more ignorant of their stereotyping than others.

But what do I know? I’m just a stay-at-home soccer mom! 😉

Reply
December 17, 2007

Doug Haslam

Great story, and glad you saw the humor in it.

I once lamented to a colleague that as a (mostly) Scot, I was upset that we didn’t have our own stereotype, sharing penury with the Jews.

His response? “I’m Greek.”

He won.

Reply
December 17, 2007

Doug Haslam

Great story, and glad you saw the humor in it.

I once lamented to a colleague that as a (mostly) Scot, I was upset that we didn’t have our own stereotype, sharing penury with the Jews.

His response? “I’m Greek.”

He won.

Reply