How Necessary Is It To Adopt A False Self In Order To Be Successful In American Society?

TOPIC HOW NECESSARY IS IT TO ADOPT A FALSE SELF IN ORDER TO BE SUCCESSFUL IN AMERICAN SOCIETY
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ADOPTING A FALSE-SELF TO SUCCEED IN AMERICA
Introduction
Minority groups have and still face insurmountable challenges in their quest to succeed in America. In particular, Asian Americans face social exclusion and discrimination right from school, work place and by extent their social life simply because they do not exemplify mainstream attributes that are considered essential for one to be truly American. To be ‘mainstream’ in America is to be white or to embody white characteristics. This has necessitated the need for ‘covering’ among such racial minority groups in a bid to gain social inclusion. In the back drop of this, such minority groups still face prejudice from the judicial system which has failed to protect their civil rights. This has led to the emergence of new civil rights movement that advocates covering ones true self so as to assimilate into the mainstream. In particular, Asian Americans face different forms of discrimination that have impeded their capacity to succeed. Although America presents unsurpassed opportunities for all, it is not reallynecessary for minority groups to adopt a false-self inorder to succeed in America. This essay reviews how Asian Americans have resort to ‘covering’ as a remedy for their social exclusion and as a means to assimilate into the mainstream.
The success of Asian Americans has not come as a result of adopting a false-self, but rather through hard work and persistence. According to Yang (2011), they have earned a title of ‘Paper Tigers’due to their academic excellence. Despite their hard work, the ‘mainstream’ still disregards them on diverse grounds. For instance, Young (2011) argues that despite their sterling performance, they are regarded as successful simply because they are‘cotched’. Notwithstanding this reality, he provides a case study which suggests that indeed Asian Americans have high intellect if SAT scores are anything to go by. Young has illustrated that In New York City, where Asians constitute a paltry 12.5% of the population, 72% of the student population at Stuyvesant, which is a specialized High school are Asian American students (p.523). He goes further to state that 569 Asian Americans were admitted the school as compared to 179 whites, 13 Hispanics and 12 Blacks. In a top New York specialized school where admission is purely based on meritocracy, he argues that this phenomenon simply illustrates that Asian Americans have the intellect to succeed. However, notwithstanding their high admission test scores, members of this community face discrimination when joining colleges. These students face discrimination since they have to work extremely hard to secure college admission as compared to their white counterparts. A sociologist professor from Princeton University observes that American colleges have taken note of the intellectual imbalance and have thus devised a “discriminatory strategy” aimed at “normalizing” the imbalance. The professor argues that for Asian American students to get an equal col...