Rainbow nation

The term Rainbow Nation was coined by Archbishop Desmond Tutu and then famously used by Nelson Mandela, who wanted to highlight a positive side of South African cultural diversity in order to unify the nation – an extremely difficult task after the end of apartheid.

I think the term is also a very fitting description of Brazilians and I do not just mean colourful outfits of samba dancers. With skin colours in all shades from northern European white to African black, this is a country where no (non-Asian looking) person will look alien. As a consequence, such diversity should mean the country does not have a problem of racism – in a world where everyone around looks slightly different, skin colour should not be an issue. Here is why:

The source of racism (apart from specific historical reasons like slavery) has to do with two things: the way our brain works and our ignorance. First, the brain: when we hear a piece of new information we like to put it in a context (why, when, where, etc.) – this facilitates memorising. As a result, we tend to remember better the information that already nicely fits the context and easier forget one that does not. If we are lucky the news will be accompanied by in-depth analysis by a well informed and communicative specialist in the field. Let’s face it, it only happens when we read good quality newspapers/magazines like The Economist. Rest of the news that hit us every day are in a raw and, often confusing, format, but our brain will still make an attempt to contextualise it. The problem is that it is unable to analyse profoundly every information, unless we make a conscious effort to do so. If we do not, it will grab the most simple explanation, using the available contexts.

Another thing worth noting is that we like to think nice things about ourselves and see negatives mainly in others. How many people really welcome criticism?

Now, minding the above - take this example: if we are white and see a black criminal on the news being handcuffed by police, the first thing we notice about him and the lens through which we will subconsciously look at him is the colour of his skin - this is quite obvious main difference between the two: we – clearly a nice person and the criminal – clearly a bad guy. This is a context. If he is white, we are more likely to think first about his social background, lack of education or bad role models in his youth - any obvious differentiator from us and, incidentally, another context.

The example above nicely leads to the issue of ignorance or, in many cases, simple lack of relevant knowledge or experience. If we have no previous experiences with black people, the context “black criminal” is created without any internal conflict against other contexts. However, if we have a black neighbour, colleague at work or even a friendly shop-assistant from local convenience store, our experiences with those people are likely to already be a separate context and the two will now clash. The strongest context (i.e. the one with more information) should then win.

Coming back to Brazil – if you have all colours of rainbow around you all the time, the rainbow itself will not be something you notice any more. Wouldn’t it be nice if all people were colour-blind?

PS. I have already written in this blog about how our brain loses against our gut, in response to the worldwide panic following Japan’s earthquake and its effects on the nuclear reactor in Fukushima. You can find it here.