Vivian's Social Contructs Essay

Vivian Martin January 11th, 2021 Ms. Brick/Humanities Social Constructs Essay The Effects of Social Constructs on Society (1) In this world, there are many people with beliefs and opinions. (2) Some of these people become famous, and end up having influence over the public, especially their audience. (3) Oftentimes, these famous people may choose to share their opinions, with their audience, by writing a book, speaking about them, writing a song, creating a TV show, or something else, making those beliefs more widespread. (5) As time passes, these beliefs may grow a larger audience, and may grow to a level where they are even better known than they were before. (6) And, as the beliefs grow traction, more people might start to adopt those beliefs, they might resonate with them, or disagree with them, even further making them a well known part of society. (7) These beliefs may become social constructs, a belief or notion constructed by society, and may start to affect the way we see people, and react to them and their behavior greatly, like in “Super Human” by Nicola Yoon, and with Unique in Glee. (TS) One group of people affected by social constructs are the Black and Indiginous People of Color (BIPOC) community, who are often treated differently because of their skin color. (EV) X, who is a black male, was shot by a police officer. (Nicola Yoon, 203) (CC) Because of the social construct that black people are inherently bad, X was shot, by someone who is supposed to be just, and unbiased. This is not an uncommon occurrence, as awful as it is. There have been many occurrences of black people being assumed to be criminals with little to no evidence or reason other than their race. (CC) Recently, the Black Lives Matter movement has been getting more attention, after the death of George Floyd, who was another black male treated with extreme violence by a police officer. It has brought to light the cases of other black people treated similarly, and has made many people realize that this is not a singular case, and that this is a real bias in law enforcement, stemming from the long lasting social construct of BIPOC people being less than, or bad. (EV) When X makes his first appearance as a superhero, the public’s reaction is mainly centered around his race. (Yoon, 198) (CC) In the story, it almost seems like the fact that X is black is more shocking than him having superpowers. This brings up the question, “Would the public react differently to a white superhero?”. In Yoon’s world, at least, the answer would most likely be yes. For instance, in the story, she writes “The Los Angeles Times headline the day after he saved her read: BLACK SUPERMAN SAVES GIRL”. (Yoon, 198). This suggests that, in the eyes of the public, he has two defining traits; his superpowers, and being black. This is implying that Superman has to be white, because X’s race is emphasized, being the first word of the headline of a major news outlet, and is seen as the one thing making him different and other than Superman. If X was white, or at least assumed to be white, there would most likely be more focus on what his superpowers are, how he got them, and where he is from, not on his race. (Trans) And that would be just one example of how black people are treated differently because of their skin color. However, this is only one social construct, there are many others. (TS) As well as BIPOC people, there are many other groups affected by social constructs, one of them being the LGBTQ+ community, who are often looked down upon by society for how they identify. (EV) Unique is transgender, and is bullied for it by several boys, who refuse to call her by her preferred pronouns, and mock her for dressing outside her biological gender. (Glee) (CC) This is a direct consequence of the social construct that gender and identity are limited to male and female. And since Unique believes and identifies differently than that, she is treated with cruelty that she does not deserve. No one deserves to be treated with such unkindness for being different, and yet this is so common. In the words of Amin Maalouf, “By their words, and by their looks, other people will make him feel he is poor, or lame, short or lanky, swarthy or too fair, or an orphan; those innumerable differences, major and minor, that define every personality and shape each individual’s behavior, opinions, fears and ambitions.” (Maalouf, 23) People who are LGBTQ+ are often treated with prejudice and unkindness, simply because the way they love, or identify, looks different from the projected normal. Even if someone is different, that does not make them less of a person, and less valuable. (EV) One of the boys mocks Unique for being LGBTQ+, by way of mocking the acronym LGBTQ. (Glee) (CC) When the boy does this, not only is he putting down Unique, he is simultaneously putting down the LGBTQ+ community as a whole and setting that example for his friends. This is a very unfair stance to take, not only because it is unkind, but also because the character is not LGBTQ+, as far as we know, so he can not, with good reason, try to stomp on the community, because he is not in it, and is not listening to what Unique, who is a part of the community has to say about it. (CS) In conclusion, the LGBTQ+ community is often treated as less than people outside of that community, which is something that needs to stop. (1) Social constructs greatly influence our immediate reactions to people, and how we interpret their actions. (2) This can be observed in the short story “Super Human”, which displays the social construct that BIPOC people are bad, and also shows how BIPOC people are treated differently because of their race. (3) It can also be seen in a clip from Glee, where Unique is bullied for being transgender by several boys in the bathroom. (4) These cases demonstrate the negative effects of social constructs, and the biases and unkindness they can cause to the groups they are opposed against. (5) And, although not all social constructs are bad, these ones certainly are, and they need to be done away with, so they stop hurting people. (6) We are all humans, and deserve to be treated as such, despite the social constructs telling us not to. (7) And as humans, we can make mistakes, be wrong and be different from one another, and that is okay. (8) Even despite these traits, we can still treat each other with empathy, support, and kindness, making the world a better place for everyone. Standing ovation!!! This is an amazing piece of writing!!! 99.5/100 RB.

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