On Moral Currency

Racist, bigoted, sexist, misogynistic, xenophobic, homophobic, toxic—buzzwords like these are gravely serious concerns that are thrown around more freely than condoms in freshman dorms. With our college’s sky-high ECON enrollments, one would assume our student body understands the basic mechanics of supply and value. The more plentiful and abundant, the cheaper and less valuable. The more scarce and rare, the more valuable. When looking at the way these moral buzzwords are used on campus, we find reason for concern. Racism, bigotry, sexism, and the lot are all issues that attack each individual’s being and identity.

I grew up on Long Island, NY, simultaneously one of the most diverse and socioeconomically-segregated geographical areas in the country. My elementary school was very racially-diverse. Race wasn’t a thing that people cared or ever talked about. When I was thirteen, I moved to the town where I’d spend the rest of my formative years—Cold Spring Harbor. For people not from Long Island, Cold Spring Harbor is an almost completely-white, very upper-middle class area. Though it might sound cliché to say, I didn’t realize I was “Asian” until I moved there. For the first time in my life, people treated me differently because of the way I looked—at least, it was the first time I noticed it. I was the only non-white student in my grade for a year or so, and I was reminded of it everyday whether in the classroom or locker room. Unsurprisingly, diversity didn’t increase much when I went to the high school of that same district. With nearly all of my classmates wealthy white Protestants or Catholics, and my teachers and coaches cut from a similar cloth, I was teased, ostracized, devalued, and treated as a constant “other” everywhere I went. Teammates were quick to insult me based on race, coaches were insensitive, and don’t get me started on other parents. There’s a certain mental shift that occurs when your school vice principal pulls you out of class to tell your parents that your course load (which you chose completely independently) was too difficult and that your parents shouldn’t push you so hard, or when (more than a few) middle-aged men you’ve never met call you a “dumb chink” and the like for decking his kid in a lacrosse game; not to mention all the teasing and insulting that happens seemingly everywhere. Not that one ought to fight fire with fire, but it’s hard to formulate a race-based comeback when your entire audience is white. There were some upsides too. I got to be the token Asian in every single activity I did. The nicknames weren’t all bad either—from being called “The Great Wall” in lacrosse or “Yao Ming” in basketball (and “Jeremy Lin” when Linsanity was a thing).

I hesitate to call what I experienced “racism.” Not that many of my negative experiences weren’t largely based on my race—they certainly were. I hesitate to call it “racism” because what I went through wasn’t all that bad. Every specific label for a problem implies a certain response. When we call something “racist” we expect people to rise up and fix the problem. In a perfect world, everything even slightly “racist” would be fixed. Unfortunately, we don’t live in a perfect world, we live in a real world—one defined by limited supply and unlimited demand. Moral labels are a currency and the more we print, the less valuable they become. When I label my experience in high school as “racist” it devalues the term and makes people take it less seriously. Clearly, I’ve made it to where I am today. Even though I’d prefer not to go through it again, what I went through was worlds better than what others have experienced. Whenever we use the term “racist” to describe relatively innocuous behavior, we lower its value. When the market of moral buzzwords becomes overflooded, “racism”—among others—becomes a worthless term, unworthy of urgent, if any, response. When Black-Americans are killed at a grossly high rate by law enforcement officials—an actual travesty (and just one of many, many possible examples)—we have no moral currency left to fix the problem. “Everything’s racist nowadays anyway, right?” By overflooding the market in this way, society has built up an apathy and far too-high tolerance for perceived moral slights. It’s a hard ask, but what I am advising here is restraint. Restraint not to call everything “racist” or “sexist” so when a serious moral boundary is crossed, we have a big enough war chest to rise to the occasion. Restraint so that, when we actually deem something racist or bigoted or xenophobic or homophobic or anything else, people actually listen. People are limited both in their ability to do good and also in their ability to care about doing good. They always will be, it’s a necessary limitation of life. We’ve got a long way to go in the process of universal moral improvement. It’s certainly an uphill marathon rather than a breezy sprint. We must all carefully pick and choose our battles and places to take a stand—with the utmost restraint.