Racism, is it Really as Black and White as it Seems?

Racism is a big issue in today's society, that part is mostly straight forward. But is it really that black and white? Racism isn't just people of one color discriminating against people of a different color, but sometimes even people of the same color discriminating against each other because of their color. It isn't even always just one person being racist to another, it could be someone being racist to themselves. The structure of today's society makes it so easy to accept stereotypes given to each race that it becomes too much of an effort to go against the stereotypes that are already put in place. For example, the stereotype that "Asians are smart" is so ingrained into us, that whenever some Asian gets a good grade, it's expected, and therefore given no attention. Up until about a year ago, I never actively supported that stereotype nor actively opposed it. However, about a year ago, something happened that made me want to oppose it strongly. 

My Asian friend and I had been walking down one of the side staircases at Troy High. She was telling me about a test whose grade she'd just received. She hadn't done well and was upset about her grade. At this point it's probably best that I tell you a bit about my friend. She's a hard worker and keeps straight A's in her classes. Now, because of this one test, her grade was a B in the class overall. She told me about how her parents were going to be upset that she hadn't gotten an A. When I asked her why that one bad grade mattered, she looked at the ground and said, "Cause Asians are supposed to be smart. I don't want to be the reason that people think they're not."

That made me think, really think. I've never been a person that endorsed stereotypes and never liked them much either, but that incident with my friend showed me how bad they really are. Today, it's so easy for us to be racist towards ourselves that it seems natural. We don't bother thinking about all the harm it really leads to. Because of that stereotype, my friend felt the pressure of representing her whole race rather than herself first. She thought of herself as an Asian first, then a hardworking student. That she was a hardworking student because she was an Asian. How ignorant do we have to be to not realize that this internalized racism has made people lose their identities as people?