[
Chuck3]:
". . . so which is it genes or environment? You don't have to
answer that."
It has long been recognised and generally agreed that most, if
not all, traits (physical and behavioural) result from a
combination and often complicated interaction between genes and
environment.
According to definitions 2 and 3 you give of prejudice, I
agree, it is bad, so it is definition 1 that I will go with
and attempt to explain and justify:
Def. 1. a preconceived opinion that is not based on reason or
experience.
First of all, one's reason and experience is always imperfect.
Secondly there are gut feelings and intuitions which come from the
subconscious and thus cannot readily be understood in terms of
reason or experience, but which I am still inclined to take very
seriously.
It is also important to consider that negative prejudices are
often complementary to positive ones. For example, identifying
spontaneously with unfamiliar members of one's own race, but not
with unfamiliar members of other races (notwithstanding that
experience, e.g. getting to know an individual, may well change
one's initial response, but as I said in a previous post, you can
only get to know a very limited number of individuals).
What makes discussions such as this so difficult are the
paradigms of STATE which assume that we (its citizens) are a
single people, committed to each other as such (equally and
without racial prejudice) and to the state as the overriding
authority we owe our shared allegiance to. As Barack Obama
puts it for America (quoting from memory):
"there are not native Americans, white Americans, black
Americans, Latino Americans, Asian Americans, etc. but just
AMERICANS; we rise or fall as one nation, as one people".
The only problem with that is that it is a LIE, but one on
which the STATE depends and bases its POWER on.
Obama's presidency I expect to help expose this LIE and lead to
a radical reassessment of the nature and role of the STATE, which
I hope to see transformed (both in America and here), peacefully
and grassroots-democratically, from an instrument of POWER,
imposing this LIE in order to exert state authority and facilitate
the exploitation of society, to an instrument of genuine (rather
than feigned) service, not to individuals so much as to the
different "peoples" or communities, into which they
will freely and grassroots-democratically self-organise, and in
which ethnicity, I am pretty sure (when individuals are free to
decide for themselves), will play a natural and important role.
If all that sound a little weird to you, as it probably will,
it is because the necessary sociopolitical paradigm shift has yet
to be made.
20 Jan 09, 5:42am
We have been taught since the cradle by the state and its institutions, and through them by society at large, that feelings of racial prejudice are evil, to be suppressed and denied in oneself and condemned in others, when in fact they are perfectly natural. As human beings we are stuffed full of prejudices about everything, especially about other people, the way they look and behave.
It would be strange and contrary to the purpose of evolution if humans did not tend to be prejudiced in favour of those most closely related to themselves, something racial characteristics are indicators of; whereby my use of "tend" is important.
Much confusion arises because racial prejudice is felt towards strangers rather than towards those we know. When we get to know someone as an individual, ethnic differences usually cease to be important (although it is interesting to consider what the reasons for this are), but how many people do we, or can we possibly, know as individuals? The vast majority remain strangers, in our assessment of whom racial prejudice will always play a role, no matter how much we may attempt to suppress and deny it, even to ourselves, because this is what "society" (i.e. the state) demands of us.
As with other feelings (anger, sexual urges, etc.) we have to control our feelings of racial prejudice (and if we don't there are social customs and laws to see that we do); we cannot simply give free expression to them; but suppressing and denying them, especially to ourselves, is NOT the best (probably the worse) way to deal with them.
21 Jan 09, 9:26am
It has long been recognised and generally agreed that most, if not all, traits (physical and behavioural) result from a combination and often complicated interaction between genes and environment.
According to definitions 2 and 3 you give of prejudice, I agree, it is bad, so it is definition 1 that I will go with and attempt to explain and justify:
First of all, one's reason and experience is always imperfect. Secondly there are gut feelings and intuitions which come from the subconscious and thus cannot readily be understood in terms of reason or experience, but which I am still inclined to take very seriously.
It is also important to consider that negative prejudices are often complementary to positive ones. For example, identifying spontaneously with unfamiliar members of one's own race, but not with unfamiliar members of other races (notwithstanding that experience, e.g. getting to know an individual, may well change one's initial response, but as I said in a previous post, you can only get to know a very limited number of individuals).
What makes discussions such as this so difficult are the paradigms of STATE which assume that we (its citizens) are a single people, committed to each other as such (equally and without racial prejudice) and to the state as the overriding authority we owe our shared allegiance to. As Barack Obama puts it for America (quoting from memory):
The only problem with that is that it is a LIE, but one on which the STATE depends and bases its POWER on.
Obama's presidency I expect to help expose this LIE and lead to a radical reassessment of the nature and role of the STATE, which I hope to see transformed (both in America and here), peacefully and grassroots-democratically, from an instrument of POWER, imposing this LIE in order to exert state authority and facilitate the exploitation of society, to an instrument of genuine (rather than feigned) service, not to individuals so much as to the different "peoples" or communities, into which they will freely and grassroots-democratically self-organise, and in which ethnicity, I am pretty sure (when individuals are free to decide for themselves), will play a natural and important role.
If all that sound a little weird to you, as it probably will, it is because the necessary sociopolitical paradigm shift has yet to be made.