Reflection paper 2

Nandi Lewis

Class: Politics 166

Professor: Barry Murdaco

Lehman College

                                           Reflection Paper

                      What I Saw In America

                        By G. K. Chesterton

   ‘A man is perfectly entitled to laugh at a thing because he happens to find it incomprehensible. What he has no right to do is to laugh at it as incomprehensible, and then criticize it as if he comprehended it. The very fact of its unfamiliarity and mystery ought to set him thinking about the deeper causes that make people so different from himself, and that without merely assuming that they must be inferior to himself”( Chesterton pg.5).

    In this specific passage by Chesterton I believe that he is highlighting the process of which one should be aware of national differences. Chesterton explains that there is nothing wrong with acknowledging one nation as different from one’s own. But to implement and define someone based on their differences and categorizing them in such a manner is false. He explains there is nothing wrong with laughing at something that seems odd; however it is best that amusement be used to find out why they are or why they go about things in such matter. In this example of Chesterton finding of the American nation, I concluded that differences are usually not understood to why they are different and that with those differences it allow people to set superiority and inferiority.

     The reason I have chosen this passage because it opened up my understanding to not be so judgmental. In the past I have found myself laughing at certain things  in life and viewing it in one way only to justify myself in what I was doing. It allow me to see that many concepts in America and to wonder if this country is really favors diversity, or is it used for free labor and oppression. Having an attitude something should not be is refusing how it became in existence which is truly what need to go further into our future. I believe this passage signifies how ignorant a person can be in disqualifying one’s self in knowledge in which is needed to create equality.