A World Not Neatly Divided

The world is not neatly divided, and it is unfortunate that is divided at all. Of course people should be entitled to their own cultures, but to stereotype and to judge based of those cultures is obscenely wrong. Amartya Sen wrote the essay “A World Not Neatly Divided” for the November 23, 2001 edition of The New York Times. Sen’s main goals for his essay was to harp on the fact that people over generalize areas of the world. For example, people assume that India is just a nation made up of Hindu people; when in fact, India has the second or third highest Muslim population in the world, as well as being compiled of many other religious cultures. Sen also states that religion isn’t the only thing that we can be identified by.
People don’t seem to realize that no matter where in the world one is, there is diversity and cultural differences. Unfortunately, it seems as if a lot of these naiveties are coming from the western culture, especially America. The general American population seemingly tunes out other cultures, and therefore do not understand and respect other parts of the world. Sen writes, “Dividing the world into discrete civilizations is not just crude. It propels us into the absurd belief that this partitioning is natural and necessary and must overwhelm all other ways of identifying people.”
Governments of today need to follow what was said by the emperor Akbar of the Mogul dynasty in India. He stated that no one “should be interfered with on account of religion” and that “anyone is to be allowed to go over to a religion that pleases him.” This is one of the bigger reasons why the United States is so attractive to many people. As well as the great opportunities it provides, the freedoms that are given to the people here are incredible and hardly matched anywhere in the world. People need to stop worrying about what others are doing and worry about their own problems. Unless people are doing harm, then they should be let alone like everyone else. People are too easily and too readily blaming others, and pointing fingers at an entire ethnic group; which is absolutely absurd. The people of the world need to enjoy and help endure their own cultures. The people of the world also need to learn to accept and coexist with one another; that with coexistence, our world can become a greater place than anyone could imagine.