Gypsies, Jews, North Africans, and Mexicans 9/28/2010

Gypsies, Jews, North Africans, and Mexicans are all connected and have something in common. They’re all minority groups and in my eyes have many stereotypes placed against them. Not only are they stereotyped, but they have all been persecuted at some point or another.

Gypsies are stereotyped as, “greedy, nit-picky, and stingy misers.” They have been depicted counting money or collecting diamonds. Gypsies are stereotyped as thieves, hopelessly nomadic, lazy and inherent, swindlers, beggars, uneducated, and sometimes as fortune tellers. North Africans and Mexicans are stereotyped as being illegal immigrants, poor, dirty, and uneducated. All these stereotypes are extremely negative and people judge these groups by only a small percentage of the group. It’s extremely unfair to take the group as whole and put an assumption on only a small portion of people. To me passing judgment on Mexicans as a whole and saying that, “All Mexicans are illegal and can’t speak a lick of English,” is very ignorant. I think that people today need to try to put themselves in someone else’s shoes before passing judgment but these stereotypes are put on certain minority groups and oppress them.

Throughout history, these minority groups have been persecuted and as I mentioned stereotyping is only one form of persecution put on these groups, but I decided to focus on stereotyping because I thought it was the biggest problem. The start of persecution of the Jews was when the Romans locked up the Jews and did not let them leave at night, also known as the “Jewish Ghettos.” Gypsies are still being persecuted today when they’re shipped illegally to other countries, including Italy and forced to sell things on the streets and for them there is no hope for tomorrow. When I first arrived in Rome I was so disgusted and quite frankly annoyed with the amount of Gypsies coming up to me begging for money and trying to sell useless products to me. Now that I know more about the history behind most of the Gypsies, I really feel for them because some of them were forced into this life, and the money they’re making, most of the time, does not go to them and they are working for nothing.

While being in Italy for the last seven weeks, I have learned so much about these minority groups: The Jews, Gypsies, North Africans, and Mexicans. Stereotyping was and still is a huge problem for these groups unfortunately. It’s very typical for people to judge certain groups because they go by what they hear and don’t really know everything behind them.