Throughout Ben Davis, there is a wide variety of students who attend our school. As we go about our day, we see students of all different sorts of ethnicities and appearances with different ideologies, interests and more.

But as the day continues, we also see the people who make fun of other students’ differences behind their back or even to their face, and sometimes it is repeated to the point that it’s bullying.

Then we see the students who are made an outsider because of their differences as they sit by themselves at lunch and class.

The problem doesn’t just exist at Ben Davis; it happens all the time in our society. People are teased over a background that makes them proud. People are made fun of due to passions they enjoy.

“When I was younger in elementary school, I always felt self-conscious about where my parents are from,” sophomore Dorothy Roggero said, “My mom is Peruvian, and my dad is Peruvian and Italian. I cared too much that people would call me out on it.”

Rather than singling people out due to their differences, we should embrace diversity, not only in appearance, but also ideologies, interests and so forth. We shouldn’t focus on someone’s differences but instead accept someone as a person overall rather than just what makes them different.

“As I grew up, I noticed that people didn’t care about my differences,” Roggero said, “They liked me as a person. I think that people became more accepting of my differences as they grew older too.”

So what could be done to end the discrimination among people with differences?

“A way to end it could be to teach kids at an early age that diversity is okay, and discrimination is wrong,” Roggero said, “Our differences, whether it be cultural or common things like music performances, makes us who we are. I think that’s important because what’s the fun in being like everyone else?”

Our differences are what makes us the unique individual that we are, and we shouldn’t get criticized because of that. We should embrace the diversity among the people around us because it has so many benefits. Not only can we can learn from those whose experiences, beliefs and perspectives are different from our own, but we can also create an atmosphere at Ben Davis that allows people to express their true self without getting teased or bullied because of their differences.