Is It OK to Fear on the Basis of Protection?

I live in a really small dorm at my college campus, and on my floor there are only ten girls. We’re a pretty tight group of friends, and we spend a lot of time just sitting around talking.

I will honestly admit that most of the time the conversation is pretty silly and juvenile, but every now and then, we get serious.

Last night was one of those nights and it turned into one of the most interesting discussions I have been a part of.

It was started by my roommate. A high school history teacher in training, she was discussing how she wanted to teach about the connection between fear and the more recent wars in America.

Our friend asked her to explain more and she launched into her philosophy on how those that grew up during World War II in America were skeptical and judgmental of the Japanese, and how this led to internment camps.

The same friend then brought up about how her grandfather had fought in Vietnam, and how he still harbors hostile feelings toward the Vietnamese.

We realized that our parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents all had somebody to fear—the Japanese, the Vietnamese, and then the Soviet Russians during the Cold War.

Then I pointed out that our generation had also come to fear those from the Middle East.

Once again, it was the result of war, only strengthening the evidence of my roommate’s argument.

What was strange about the discussion was that when I brought up the fact that young adults in America fear the Middle East, it was like I was bringing a new realization to the surface. It was almost as if we had never noticed our fear and our skepticism until the words were spoken out loud.

I think this is because we are somewhat ashamed of what fear has caused us to think.

I thought back to a week ago, when I was waiting in airport security. There was a Middle Eastern family in front of me. I overheard a man behind mumble to his friend that he hoped that family wasn’t on the same flight as him.

I had a moment of cognitive dissonance—or discomfort that arises from having conflicting feelings. I was mad at the man for making assumptions of this family. But at the same time, I was also slightly scared.

I felt embarrassed, and I tried to pass it off as something else. I was feeling that way for other reasons—I just had to say bye to my family for a semester, I was tired, I wasn’t thinking straight because I was nervous about getting in a plane crash, and so on.

But truth is, I was scared because I grew up being taught to fear those that can harm us. And when you are eight years old and you see Al Qaeda hijack a plane and kill 3,000 people, you become scared of people that look and resemble Al Qaeda.

It’s not fair. It is not fair to the family that ended up sitting near me on the flight that was subjected to tighter security measures and the fear of other passengers simply because of how they look. I found out that they were like any other family—a businessman and teacher from Denver who had two daughters.

When I told my friends about this experience, somebody mentioned that while we feel ashamed of how we think, the fear that we have is natural.

“It makes sense, though,” they said, “It makes sense that our parents and grandparents were scared. It makes sense that we are. We have to be, to protect ourselves.”

That comment of “we have to be to protect ourselves” alarmed me. If we use that to justify our actions, then we make it OK to fear anyone who is not like us.

And we do not live in a homogenous world with one culture. We don’t even live in a city that is the same.

Is it right to base fear on the platform of protection? I don’t think it’s right, yet it is happening.

Our dorm discussion moved to this question, and I mentioned that we are already being told to fear a lot of people.

I brought up not just the stereotypes of those from the Middle East, but other places. What about North Korea? They have nuclear weapons. What about China? They are Communists, and we should fear them (despite also relying on them for many of our products). What about Somalia? They have pirates that will take over ships. And what about the entire religion of Islam? They are linked to terrorism and mistrust too.

And if we fear all of these countries, how many countries fear us? The argument that America should be feared because we are a leading country in the world might strike some patriotic chords, but it is also supporting the acceptance of fearing those that we do not understand.