Samuel P. Huntingtons ‘The Clash of Civilizations’ and the Problem of Labelling Others: Critical Essay

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Why are we labeling people? Why are we involuntarily biased? On the off chance that you arranged too many arbitrarily chosen individuals from over the earth, none of them would share the same skin tone or religion. You could classify them from darkest to lightest or from Muslim countries to Western countries. There would be too many reasons that lead us to label people classifications like ‘dark’ and ‘white’. These classifications are the same as a believer or disbeliever, labeling and classifying is one problem but the question that led by this problem happened to be bigger, which is the clash of civilizations. We shouldnt classify people by their skin color or religion. There is another problem occurring. What are the reasons for the clash of civilizations? The cause of the clash of civilizations is ignoring. The fact that states have different historical backgrounds, languages, cultures, traditions, and religions, and how this ignorance happens? It happens through classification to decide the social, political, and financial prosperity of the individuals, as Huntington does.

Samuel P. Huntingtons (1993) article The Clash of Civilizations acknowledged that the extraordinary divisions among mankind and the dominating origin of disagreement will be cultural. Nation-states will remain the most dominant performing artists in world undertakings, however, the primary clashes of worldwide governmental issues will happen among countries and gatherings of various civilizations. The conflict of human progress will mandate worldwide global politics. Conflicts between cultures will be more problematic in the future (p.22). However, I believed that these differences would lead countries to more diverse humanity, and this variability helps a livable place for citizens. If there is a person that comes from different cultures, this helps to defend minority rights and lead the country to a more democratic place.

In accordance with Samuel P. Huntington (1993), European communities will share cultural features that distinguish them from Arab or Chinese communities. He discriminates against people and has double standards toward the West. In some dimensions, for example, basic interests and advanced expertise unite in manners that give the lie to a promote limit among the West and Islam yet. In addition, over a wide span of time state nothing of the actual ideas of personality and nationality, about which there are unending differences and discussion. I believe these classifications of the West and Islam do not apply to the current world problem. This problem should solve over the years, but it wouldnt, because people always tend to classify each other, therefore there will be always a good or bad side. For instance, if you called yourself us, others would be a bad side. This is the same as religion and skin color. Obviously, there shouldnt have a bad or good side of society or community or between people.

In agreement with Huntington (1993), Civilization is the highest cultural grouping of the people, and the broadest level of cultural identity people have short of that which distinguishes humans from other species (p.24). He assisted that conflicts come from cultures. I disagree with this argument because Huntington’s classification is not based on a cultural criterion, and classifying countries such as the West or Islam is not a correct idea to support. If we are living in the laciest world, we shouldnt discriminate against Islam as well. Huntington refers to Islam as a not only country but also people. Even if he suggests the East instead of Islam, this would be more understandable or ignorable. In that case, we couldnt think he is labeling people and states. We would understand that he refers to the geographic location of nations.

To sum up, labeling is one of the most basic forms of categorizing people without taking a holistic approach as a human, without listening and thinking. First of all, this movement is the main reason for conflict, separation, and alienation within society. A utopia where all people respect each other and are not stigmatized and labeled because of their looks will indeed only remain as a utopia. It is impossible for a person who thinks with mental labels to categorize people, to treat people like an item rather than a person with good intentions. For whatever reason, it is not right to label human beings as things that are not rational, with innumerable factors such as social environment, mood, and instant variability. Muslim or atheist, wearing the headscarf or mini skirt, was born in the East or West, skin color white or black is the most common form of labeling. We dont need such labels for each other, these do not help us understand each other. If people cant live without categorizing, they should tie their eyes to avoid labeling. Speaking of classifying people, it does not appropriate without thinking about racism. Its prejudiced to argue that physical differences between races create differences in people’s abilities and that some races are superior to others. These views are based on the classifications that distinguish people as white, black, yellow, brown, and red according to the color of their skin. In some cases, ethnicity and national origin can be subject to racist people. To brief, I dont agree the Huntingtons discriminated idea about the West and others, because at that moment we start to categorize cultures, nations, and individuals. That discrimination brings immutable effects on all parts of society.

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