Pardon me! May I correct you? Confronting microaggression in everyday life

• Ever thought why you are inclined towards watching stand -up comedy and enjoy when they sarcastically ridicule reality you live every day?
• Why Rap genre in music receives the highest chunk of admirers?

These 21st-century activities are a response to microaggression people go through in their day to day life. Before moving forward, you should know what is a microaggression? Well, it is a form of implicit bias, expressions of personal or group prejudices, stereotypes or attitudes, expressed through intentional bigoted statements, holding the other group of low opinion responsible. There is a limitless expression of microaggression in our society in the form of micro insults, microassaults, microinvalidations (Sue 2007). It is everyday intentional or unintentional discrimination which perpetrators aren’t consciously aware of. In layman terms, we can say that it is an overt form of passive aggression.

For example- when someone assumes your ethnicity based on your appearance or generalizes hatred on your community; this behavior comes under the three forms of microaggression.

However, people on the receiving end respond to microaggression strongly, all the revolutions against sexism, racism, fascism or religious stigmatization are an outcome of this realization. Artists of creative or scientific temperament have always enlightened people with literature, social commentary, documentary, theatre art, painting, etc. Gradually with time the trends have changed, the advent of social media has facilitated journalism in ways that it has developed so many branches of its own. Apart from former ways of approaching the minds, there are now blogs, podcasts, V-logs, etc. What amuses the masses most is Comedy, as J.B Priestley once said: “Comedy, We may say, is society protecting itself with a smile”. Stand-up comedy is one such forum where opinions are masked in the form of sarcasm and carefree jokes. A larger section of society watches it both online & offline because stand-up comedians reflect a chunk of society being marginalized due to their opinion. Most of them raise awareness and try to inspire through their creativity in a way that lucid in the minds of people.

The best way of handling microaggression is not reacting but responding towards it, the purpose should not be “Eye for an eye” but to educate a person about their biasness. Confrontations are not easy, however, you can do better. Psychologists suggest that one should not denunciate the individual but their microaggressive behavior. If you are well-read about the biasness it would help you to put shreds of evidence for the point you are trying to make. Moreover, if the microaggressor becomes angry just give a small food for thought and leave.