<p>So I am from an affluent white suburban town and I play football at Lehigh University. I recently had a conversation with my black teammate where I said that I didnt racism existed anymore and he stood up in the middle of the lunchroom and told me in a loud voice that i was wrong...anyone think this could make a good essay?</p>
<p>Did it have an impact on you?</p>
<p>I am writing my essay on exactly that. Word for word. Black teammate. Racism. Lunchroom... </p>
<p>this is strange.</p>
<p>I wouldn't write about it, but I generally don't like those racism essays. Also, if you think that racism doesn't exist anymore, then writing about it will basically defeat your purpose.</p>
<p>^ I think what he means is that from this experience, his outlook changed and now he realizes that racism does exist.</p>
<p>You know why this guy's essay topic sounded so familiar to mine? Because it was my FREAKING roommate playing a practical joke freaking me out. I was like, "How the hell do we have the exact, same topic, and we are both football players with the exact same GPA and SAT scores?" and he was laughing in the background. The only thing he changed was Lehigh, we don't go to Lehigh.</p>
<p>lol .</p>
<p>Anyway - there are plenty of people writing about racism, that wouldn't be very unique. Unless you really cannot find anything else or that incident completely changed your life, I wouldn't go for it. Just my opinion.</p>
<p>Well as kid growing up in a rich white suburb, what kind of hardships would I been through? Once my iPod ran out of batteries during a cruise to the Bahamas and now I know the meaning of living resourcefully? My parents bought me a Camry instead of a Lexus, and now I understand what it means to be poor?</p>
<p>I mean, I'll be frank with ya, pretty much I've been catered to all my life, I never really had any REAL obstacles. It's not like I had to dodge bullets in refugee camps and live in a shopping cart or support my 8 other siblings or something like that. This is pretty much it. Unless I start making up stuff, which I don't want to do.</p>
<p>And PS... racism isn't unique because racism is something that a lot of people have to deal with! You can write about a common topic and MAKE your essay unique, depending on your writing style and voice.</p>
<p>Thank you for your input though, Dr.</p>
<p>As I said wraider, if you have an extremely important experience connected to racism, it's fine to write about it. It's also fine to write about a common topic in an uncommon way. I guess a big part of why I personally wouldn't write an essay about racism has to do with my personal philosophy. I don't want to explain it in great detail now, but I basically believe this:</p>
<p>Talking about racism is rarely useful. I don't think that anybody should have rights because (s)he belongs to a certain group of people, but because (s)he is an individual. I also do not think that racism is something 'natural'. For example, I personally had never ever even thought of distinguishing between people based on their skin color. It's an artificial distinction. I mean, we also do not really distinguish between people based on their eye color, so why should we do so based on their skin color? Merely saying "racism is bad", which, of course, it is, automatically creates a different impression: it creates the impression that there is an issue, that it is somewhat logical to make differences between people based on their skin color. Saying "racism is bad" creates an argument about an issue that is actually non-existing. There just is no argument. </p>
<p>Now, I could go on about this for hours, but I hope you understand what I mean, at least a little bit. Probably a lot of people will disagree with me on this, especially since the US way of thinking in respect to this is very different to mine, but that's okay. In a way I just think that merely talking about racism, no matter what one says about it, is bad. Unfortunately I'm defeating my own purpose right now, but that's just the way it is. A usual counter-argument is that we should learn from our past and that racism really had a significant influence and that many people suffered from it, and I agree. Yet, we do not learn from history. We just don't do that. </p>
<p>But this forum is not about politics or philosophy, so I'll end my post here. Just for clarification: I did not mean to insult anybody, and if anybody should feel offended, I'm very sorry. </p>
<p>One more thing, wraider: I actually think that an essay about your life -- that you didn't really encounter any obstacles etc. -- could be very good. You could say how it influenced you and how you hope to find challenges etc. in college. Well, just my thoughts :)</p>
<p>Not sure where you guys got the idea that the First Experience essay has to be about some major mental reversal or huge deprivation that you have overcome. If it's a stretch, you're going to sound inauthentic.</p>
<p>I wrote my essay about my first concert, when I was 4, and how touched I was by it despite being very small and craning my neck from the seat top in the last row of the venue. I contrasted this to my revisit of the same performer when I was 18, from a much better vantage point, and how I didn't enjoy the show nearly as much. This wound up fitting well with my Why Penn essay, as it led naturally into how I had developed an interest in the (live) music business.
That said, it's not necessary for your essays to fit together, but if you can do it, it probably doesn't hurt. </p>
<p>This topic would not have worked for anyone else, because the experience was completely unique to me. Try to find something like that. Pick something you care about, a LOT, and try to think back to your first point of contact with that event/activity. You can write about a fishing trip, the first time you finished a book, your first trip abroad... whatever. If it reflects a larger interest of yours, and it can somehow relate to your exploration/discovery strategy at Penn (a point you should take care to draw out), I think that's all you need. </p>
<p>REMEMBER: You can't fake passion - don't even try. Don't write to impress the reader. Be true to yourself.</p>
<p>Dude racism is always gonna exist- but go ahead and keep listening to Obama. Its a sad fact of life, but there will ALWAYS be racism.</p>