Week 7: March 3 (2 of 2)

Now I am going to move on to the second half of this week's reflection: my experiences at this year's Iowa State Conference on Race and Ethnicity (abbreviated as ISCORE). This conference is in my opinion a great way to open the eyes of college students to the differences around them and allow them to be more aware and tolerant of diversity on the Iowa State campus.

I attended the session entitled, "Dumb Things We Need to Stop Saying and Other Practical Steps to Increase Our Effectiveness Around Diversity." I thought it was a very eye-opening experience about some of the things we say that may be offensive or suggestive to those of different ethnic backgrounds, which usually was never the intent of the speaker. I know I'm guilty of that a lot of times, since my level of diversity tolerance could definitely be higher.

The presenter used four main concepts as tips for dealing with the "oops" things that come out of our mouths when it relates to diversity. First, she told us about the "intent v. impact" concept; just because we may not intend to harm another person with our words does not mean we still don't end up harming that person. A tip to handle this was apologizing without becoming defensive. The second concept was P.O.P. (pile on principle), which basically meant that people of different backgrounds may already deal with intolerance during their daily routines, and what you just said to offend them could be the straw that breaks the camel's back. A tip to handle this is to show empathy for that person. The thrird concept was to remember our priveleges (a head start in life; every group has it and doesn't have to ask for it). A great metaphor the presenter used was "some people are born on third base and think they've hit a triple." Tips for handling priveleges include reminding ourselves that we've been given a head start in life, not everyone is as fortunate as us, and what matters most is what you do with the advantages you've been given. The final concept was called "raising the BAR." BAR stands for breathe, acknowledge, respond. To me, this is similar to "think before you speak." We spent the rest of the session going over examples of derogatory comments that are sometimes said, and whether the speaker meant it to be offensive or not.

Overall, I thought it was a very enjoyable workshop, though I did have a feeling that some of the derogatory comments that they were using as examples didn't really apply to the whole group. Some people don't have to deal with the horrible or racist comments that other ethnic groups do. It was definitely something to think about, though!