In each society, there have always been people who differentiated from others. The characteristics that lead to the differences include sexual orientation, gender identity, race, ethnicity, and other important issues. In some periods, those who did not belong to so-called standard groups were treated badly; at times though, they received respect from others (Lawson, 2016). Nowadays, in spite of the fact that significant effort has been made to improve the situation with social inequality, society is still far from accepting “non-standard” men and women (Randall et al., 2017). The purpose of this paper is to represent and analyze the experience, beliefs, ideas, and the attitude to inequality of two people who are not seen as normal by conservative society members.
Black Lesbian
Lisa George is a person who has been often treated unfairly due to who she is. When Lisa was 7, the girl and her family moved from a friendly community where there were many black families to a conservative port-city. New neighbors treated them icily; nevertheless, the family tried to behave as usual. Although the parents have noticed that two other black families of the city had a reclusive life and never let their children play in the street, they did not follow the example.
Lisa walked alone without fear; soon, she found new friends and joined them in their games. However, when adults learned about that children were forbidden to communicate with the black girl. Furthermore, they started calling her names and wrote insulting phrases on the fence. Lisa still remembers an episode when her former friends offended her most. That day, she made an attempt to put up with kids and came to the shore where boys and girls were playing in boats. Lisa wanted to join them but children did not let her do so. They sent her out calling the girl names and demonstrating that she is not good enough to be their friend. On the way home, Lisa cried all the time; after this episode, she did not make any attempts to acquire pals in the city.
During the formative years, Miss George started thinking about self-identification and gender issues. In her opinion, being a girl gave an opportunity to wear dresses and thus, was good. At the same time, boys could date girls and this was an advantage for the person because she started experiencing love towards people of the same sex at early age. When Lisa was 11, she fell in love with a girl for the first time although boys have always been unattractive to her. Nevertheless, Lisa’s mind seemed to let this pass; besides, this fact did not influence her life. “Either I did not take it seriously, or my brain refused to think about it,” the woman confessed. Later, Lisa faced the difficulty of rejecting herself and the fact that she would need to talk about it. This was a problem to the woman, because she grew up in a religious family and regarded herself as a sinner. Moreover, she could not talk to anyone about the difficulties because due to the race, Lisa did not have any friends. Later, the woman discussed her orientation with parents and they surprisingly supported her.
In fact, Miss George went through a considerable amount of internal homophobia; it manifested itself in Lisa’s lack of desire to leave her room and meet new people. She locked herself in a room and got up only to get drunk and fall asleep. Lisa didn’t want to live at all; there were suicidal thoughts. Lisa was saved by two friends who came to visit her and brought food (Slater et al., 2017). Thanks to them, the woman realized she needed professional help and turned to a psychologist. It took her 4 years to cope with the problem and return to a normal life. Now, Lisa George accepts her sexual orientation and believes that every person has the right to be whatever they want. Because of being a lesbian, she has become an atheist for it was difficult for the woman to understand why the God creates homosexual people who are then regarded as sinners by religion. As for race problems, Miss George has moved to a more progressive and friendly community where no one bullies her. In Lisa’s view-point, those who treated her badly during the school years were just foolish.
Disabled Man with Low Incomes
John Morris suffers from cerebral spastic infantile paralysis; he does not walk and hardly can speak. Besides, the man cannot use his hands; at the same time, John works on a computer, watches movies, listens to audio books, and writes correctly. “I am very grateful to humanity for the creation of the Internet,” John confessed. Computer technologies make it much easier for the disabled person to communicate with the world. “Although, to be honest, I have repeatedly thought that either I was not for this world, or this world was not for me,” the man stated. According to him, many people consider disabled people selfish but it is not true. The point is that such individuals are simply not able to take care of themselves. All in all, Mr. Morris has got used to his status and believes that there was a good reason why the God gave him with the disease named.
The greatest difficulties John has to struggle with are his socioeconomic status and people’s attitude toward him. Now, his mother, an elderly woman, takes care of her son; Mr. Morris is afraid even to guess what is going to happen to him after her death. In fact, the man does not want to be treated in special institutions because he has heard stories of negligent and even mocking attitude towards disabled people. At the same time, John has no other relatives; that is why he lives for the day. When Mr. Morris and his mother spend their time outside, for example, in a park, sometimes, impolite people ask the woman if her son is mentally ill. Some might insult both the old lady and the man; others try to give alms although John has no cap or sign asking for money (Temple et al., 2019). Such episodes insult the man most; he cannot understand why people are so cruel and cannot just pass by him.
Speaking about financial problems, two pensions are all sources of income John and his mother have. Sometimes, charity organizations help the family but both the man and woman are proud and prefer to cope with money issues on their own. The worst thing about the situation, according to John, is that he cannot change anything: the socioeconomic status will always remain the same due to his health problems.
Compare-and-Contrast Analysis
Both John and Lisa are people who differentiate from the so-called standard group of the population. Although the reasons for this are different, the man and the woman have both been treated badly by others; however, it is important that their parents support them. As for the differences between the cases, Lisa has suffered much because she could not accept who she is while John was harmed most by other people’s reactions. In conclusion, thanks to the task and the interviews, I have learned that it is important to be tolerant and respect every member of society.
References
Lawson, A. (2016). European Union non-discrimination law and intersectionality: Investigating the triangle of racial, gender and disability discrimination. Routledge.
Randall, A. K., Tao, C., Totenhagen, C. J., Walsh, K. J., & Cooper, A. N. (2017). Associations between sexual orientation discrimination and depression among same-sex couples: Moderating effects of dyadic coping. Journal of Couple & Relationship Therapy, 16(4), 325-345.
Slater, M. E., Godette, D., Huang, B., Ruan, W. J., & Kerridge, B. T. (2017). Sexual orientation-based discrimination, excessive alcohol use, and substance use disorders among sexual minority adults. LGBT Health, 4(5), 337-344.
Temple, J. B., Kelaher, M., & Williams, R. (2019). Disability discrimination and avoidance in later life: prevalence, disability differentials and association with mental health. International Psychogeriatrics, 31(9), 1319-1329.