White supremacy has been around for many years. It is defined as the racist belief that white people are superior to people of other races and therefore should be dominant over them. We don’t know when white supremacy started but we have an idea as to when it did, and that being when the Constitution was signed. The few ideas that can help understand white supremacy is learning the history.
Social stratification is the root cause of all the social evil and human indignity the world is experiencing today. White supremacy started after the creation of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.
The Declaration of Independence purpose was to cut ties between the American colonies and Great Britain and establish a new country that would take its place. The confident statement “all men are created equal,” with “unalienable rights” to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” put notions of freedom and equality at the heart of the American experiment.
The Constitution which united the colonies into states, was also tainted. It came into existence after the compromise of the institution of slavery (Gordon-Reed 2). Both the Declaration of independence and the Constitution were to protect those who lived in the new world. The Constitution protected the act of slavery, it gave slave owners the right to capture fugitive slaves that crossed state lines and counted those slaves as three-fifths of a person.
Unlike the indentured servants, slavery was an inherited condition (Gordon-Reed 3). With this the children that were born of a slave didn’t have a choice but to be forced into the hard labor their parents went through. The act of slavery isn’t the only example of white supremacy, in America there is a well-known group known as the Ku Klux Klan aka the KKK. The KKK is an organization in the United States that encourages white supremacy and anti-Semitism.
The KKK has been around for many years, in the decade of 1920 the Klan had hired a public relations firm in hopes to present itself as a “fraternal Protestant organization that championed white supremacy as opposed to marauders of the night” (Baker, Kelly). The Klan wanted to ensure that the white/Caucasian race was still superior to African Americans and other religious groups. The Klan believes “white skin will not redeem a black heart” (Baker, Kelly). This means that the Klan did not want to gain back the hearts of African Americans.
Today there are still white supremist groups that take part in rallies. Various aspects affect social stratification, like wealth, power and prestige.
Wealth is a total asset, currency, and investments owned by an individual or a family and this include money, houses, vehicles, and businesses (Lenski, 123).
Power is that ability where an individual gets to accomplish goals and objectives regardless of the dominant opposition forces. The more the wealth, the higher ability to manipulate to achieve your goals.
Lastly, prestige is the social status that one holds in the society which comes with respect and popularity. Social identity is affected by various factors that also affect one’s daily life including age, gender, and race. Social class is a group of individuals within society lying under one bracket of economic status.
