Athena, we were just talking about serfs and slaves yesterday after watching Simple History's video on "Life in Medieval Times"! We also got into a discussion about political power gradually accruing to the peasant class over centuries. We do a lot of drawing contests, and the one elective they go to every day (I have them all day except for one period is more exact) is computerized automated design (CAD). I highlight classical music with Doodelchaos's awesome Linerider videos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RIz3klPET3o&ab_channel=DoodleChaos
and similar stuff. I try and give them a rounded education.

The division between rich and poor permeates society and it can be invisible at times. In some ways, it is less clear than in other societies because education can allow for a whole lot of movement. Also, there is so much of a spectrum that it can be a continuum. I would say that in most cases people at the extreme ends of the spectrum are subject to hostile prejudiced projection.

The idea of pointing to people as smelling can be a very subtle, but powerful form of prejudice equal to that of perceiving others as less clean. The thing is that people can often back up these claims in relation to certain people having poor personal hygiene. Unfortunately, sometimes when people are depressed they are less inclined to wash.
Really, I think that the key issue is to help, with sensitivity, the person to improve in order to enable them to have less of a battle against potential prejudice against the person encounter all the subtle prejudices towards mental illness.


Another pervasive prejudice in our society is that of people being overweight. Of course, in general the population in Western societies are getting larger. But, people who are overweight are often perceived and treated so negatively. Many teenagers have become anorexic as a result of being told as children that they are too fat.

I would guess that this whole area of subtle prejudice is about the whole social discourse of interaction and stereotypes, in general.

↪Athena Athena, we were just talking about serfs and slaves yesterday after watching Simple History's video on "Life in Medieval Times"! We also got into a discussion about political power gradually accruing to the peasant class over centuries. We do a lot of drawing contests, and the one elective they go to every day (I have them all day except for one period is more exact) is computerized automated design (CAD). I highlight classical music with Doodelchaos's awesome Linerider videos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RIz3klPET3o&ab_channel=DoodleChaos
and similar stuff. I try and give them a rounded education. — RogueAI

Can I access the "Life in Medieval Times" that you used in class? What was said of feudalism? According to the information I have, the Catholic church attempted to maintain a human morality that was not maintained towards the end of feudalism and not at all maintained during industrialization.

What was said of serfdom and the struggle to stay out of serfdom towards the end of the Hundred's Year War and end of the plagues that wiped out the population, resulting in not enough people to farm, kind of the same reasons Rome became Feudal forcing people to stay on the land and farm. The story is complex and I don't think 6th graders are ready for all the complexity, but as we deal with racism today, that piece of history seems very important.

My favorite teacher was my 6th-grade teacher. He had lived on an Indian reservation and attempted to bring that influence into the classroom. After teaching of the native American organization of chiefs and families, he had us spend the day outside creating a native American village. I think it would be really cool to do the same with a middle-age feudal system manor.

The art/musical is exciting. I can see the introduction of math concepts but they flicked past so fast it was somewhat interesting but lacked meaning. I hope it is complimented with lessons that fill in the meaning. Have you seen the Flatland movies? My great-grandson very much enjoyed them and he also was fascinated by the videos about origami "Between the Lines". It is sad so many children avoid math because it is so fascinating! It really needs to be taught with art and music.

The book "A Beginner's Guide to Constructing the Universe" is beyond 6th grade interest but a teacher familiar with this book can tie math to science in very interesting ways. https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=3JwMAwAAQBAJ&gl=us&hl=en-US&source=productsearch&utm_source=HA_Desktop_US&utm_medium=SEM&utm_campaign=PLA&pcampaignid=MKT-FDR-na-us-1000189-Med-pla-bk-Evergreen-Jul1520-PLA-eBooks_Science&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIwsf4wfvG7gIVMQV9Ch0ifQ45EAQYASABEgJeHvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

Another pervasive prejudice in our society is that of people being overweight. Of course, in general the population in Western societies are getting larger. But, people who are overweight are often perceived and treated so negatively. — Jack Cummins

That's somewhat different. One cannot help one's gender, one's skin colour, one's sexuality. One can certainly do something about one's weight in almost all cases. When people judge, say, a person of a particular ethnicity as being criminal, they are prejudging someone as being something they can control on the basis of something they cannot. Judging that overweight people aren't looking after themselves in quite basic ways is not the same. That's not to say that losing excess weight isn't hard -- it is: as an ex-smoker, I know how difficult overcoming cravings are -- but it is something that is good to overcome. One should not, by contrast, feel one ought to overcome one's gender, skin colour or sexuality.

I would say that characteristics such as being overweight fall into a grey area within the realm of prejudice. It is certainly not regarded as one of the protected characteristics. However, I have known a number of people who really felt discriminated against on this basis. I know that you say that it is something that can be overcome, but I am not sure that it is that simple for all individuals as I do think that some people have more of a tendency to put on weight than others.

But my understanding of prejudice is based on Goffman's understanding of stigma, in which a specific aspect of the person is an overriding factor in their interactions and has implications for the whole nature of identity. Personally, I had really bad acne as a teenager, which I did believe was beyond my control, and I did feel that was stigmatising. I am also quite a bit below average height and I would say that all such aspects about personal life do have implications for how people treat us.

So, I am would certainly say that the protected characters which are focused on are essential, but I think that any wider discussion of prejudice needs to embrace thinking about assumptions about people in the broadest sense. I think that the wider picture of assumptions enables more reflection about the whole way in which we form assumptions and allows for depth rather than just what can appear to be 'preaching' about equal opportunities.

I would say that characteristics such as being overweight fall into a grey area within the realm of prejudice. — Jack Cummins

Yeah, that's basically all I mean. It's not that there isn't a prejudiced reaction, but it is a very distinct ballpark to incidental physical characteristics.

For instance, because racism and homophobia exist, black and gay pride make sense as compensating ideas. Fat pride -- and people have tried it -- is less justifiable as a response to weight prejudice since it would be endorsing a lifestyle that is the #1 medical problem (in the UK at least). And ultimately that's what obesity is: a national health problem due principally to lifestyle choice, not an incidental physical characteristic one is born with or a fluke of historical circumstance.

I'd put obesity in the same bracket as drug or alcohol addiction: indeed, it is becoming increasingly accepted that it is, in good part, an addiction. As with those, it's something you can sympathise with and wish to help with, but not something that should be enabled or encouraged.

I am certainly not endorsing becoming overweight or addiction but I do have questions about the moralistic nature and tone of some health promotion programs. I do think that there is a bit too much preaching going on.

Well, they have a vested interest. It appears that, left to their own devices, most people will harm themselves in this way. Health services have two goals: keep people healthy; fix unhealthy people. The latter is incredibly expensive where I am. I think efficacy should come first, although I'm not sure how efficacious preaching is either. I think things like five-a-day has a positive impact on a minority, but doesn't seem to make much of a dent in the broader population.

I think that what may happen is that in the near future we are going to have restrictions placed on us to try to enforce healthy lifestyles upon us. I have seen snippets of this in bits of news, such as the idea of sugar tax. I am not in favour of unhealthy living and there is no denying that obesity, heart disease and diabetes are on the rise.

What I am wary of is totalitarian regimes slipping in the backdoor. One concern which I have about the way is which we are becoming used to living with social restrictions in the pandemic, is what is coming next. I think that it is a possibility that in the future we are likely to have our life choices curbed by a whole array of rules and regulations under the rhetoric of health.

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What you have said makes a lot of sense. I think that we cannot ever remove all prejudice from our thinking and behaviour. I see it is an ideal to work with. It could be seen as about trying to make what is unconscious revealed consciously, or of seeking to become aware of our blindspots.

I can give you a little example for reflection. A couple of years ago, I was having a discussion with a female friend about music. She remarked that my music was all male singers and bands. I said that was the music I liked. She suggested that I was sexist in my music taste. I was a bit cross, saying that it was more about taste rather than anything else. However, since being in that conversation I have found that I am more aware of this area of preference and I have found some female singers I like now.

My example is outside the usual structure of thinking about prejudice because music taste is a personal preference. It is not as if I am a judge in a music contest. But I guess that on some level personal preference is something that has a collective dimension. If the people in power exercise their personal preferences most of the time it can be a way in which the status quo is maintained, unquestioned.

So, what I am really saying is that the main thing is that we think about preference and try to understand the whole nature in which prejudice, if only subtle, impacts on the way we see and live.

Thank you for expanding our awareness of prejudice and including people who are overweight. I think we could add cognitively challenged people to the list of people who we discriminated against. In my state, we even sterilized them without their consent, but that would now be illegal. I and have heard hard horror stories of terrible things people have said to someone with a disability or a Japanese and Caucasian mixed child. The people who said the terrible things seemed to assume they had the right to have the world to themselves, without people who offend them because they look different. A mindset I absolutely do not understand.

We have more people moving around the world than ever before. I wonder if we will get used to people looking different and overcome our prejudices? I think where I live we have become more accepting of differences but on TV the news of other places makes me think there are some places that are not accepting of people who are different.

Yes, I think that there are many deep seated prejudices against people with learning disabilities. I have come across many well educated people who believe that all attempts to abort such people should take place, and I think that in the case of someone who finds out at an early stage of pregnancy that they are going to have a profoundly disabled child, physically or mentally must have an agonising decision to make. It is hard to imagine the full extent of this.

One thing which I have discovered in London and England as a whole is that many of the most severe learning disabled people are in institutions in remote places, in outskirts of villages. To me, this shows how they are cast out of view, in hidden places, where many will never have to catch sight of them.

One other prejudice from the earlier part of the last century was of unmarried pregnant women who were often incarcerated indefinitely in mental health institutions. I believe that there was a decision to free them back into the community at one point, but I think this was problematic because they had not acquired the necessary skills to live independently.

You are so right about throwing people out of institutions and leaving them to fend for themselves without being prepared to do so.

It is not natural for humans to live in huge populations where they are strangers to each other because there are too many people for us to know everyone. Now instead of having personal relationships with everyone, we are impersonal and sometimes dehumanizing. This can be a good or a bad thing.

In a small town where everyone knows Tom is limited in what he can do, people may go out of their way to create jobs for him or to buy what he is selling. However, if Sarah has a baby out of wedlock, she and her child may be shunned and they are much better off in a large city.

Even better than a large city is a large city that has a seaport and an influx of people from around the world because such cities will be cosmopolitan. The center of a large continent will not be cosmopolitan.

I think we might want to be aware of what our environment has to do with our values and behaviors. In a small town, people are more apt to help each other, but that includes protecting the community by ostracizing undesirable people. In a large city where people are strangers to each other, we may not get the help we need, without the government providing assistance, but we also can avoid the ostracizing of the small town. However, because we are strangers to each other, there is more reliance on background checks, before we rent a home or get a job or get a loan, and this can marginalize people which is as bad as being ostracized. Such marginalizing leads to poverty and other social problems.

The world never had so many people, and we never had as much opportunity as we have now. I am shocked by how we talk about child care as if we have always relied on paid child care providers, instead of mothers who were forced to stay home for social and economic reasons. In our news is how awful it is that mothers must give up their jobs to care for their children, and that child care providers don't have jobs because we are not leaving our children in child care centers. In my old books, I read how institutions can not do for a child what a parent does, because of the difference in the relationship with a paid person, or with the parent, and today this is not in our thoughts! :scream: But nothing is more important to our humanness than how we are raised. I am not sure institutionalizing our children is a good thing, any more than backgrounds are a good thing?

I think I got a little off-topic. Bottom line, our lives are about our relationships and the world is changing and we are learning as we go.

You speak about children being institutionalised and what I would add is that older people are being institutionalised more and more. Obviously, this is questionable, but I realise that it is complicated because people don't all have family members who are able to care for them. Also, people are living much longer. That means that if people are living into their nineties it could mean potentially that their children could themselves be in their seventies.

I suppose the biggest problem with institutions is if it is a way of dumping people who are less able, as a means of casting them out as the forgotten citizens.

Oh my goodness. Check your other thread. While you were working on this post, I was working on a post in your other thread and that one addresses what you said here. :grin: :heart:

I suspect that there is no metric for making that determination.

I would offer that IT is not about where you are and what must be fixed at any cost. It's all about which direction your arrow is pointed, what you aspire to. Write it down and turn it over to that lady who receives ALL of the sensory input. She'll get you there eventually and remind you when you fall off the wagon along the way.

...or maybe not.

You say that it is 'about what which direction your arrow is pointed, what you aspire to'. I am not sure that many people consciously choose to remain prejudiced, but probably don't stop and consider their own prejudices. Perhaps, it is so much easier to see the problem 'out there' and point the finger of blame at others, and each of us may do this to some extent. I am probably coming to this from a bit of a psychoanalytic and I am translating it into the framework of philosophy.

Please excuse my torpor as I have not read every post but I believe you must make the distinction between pre-judging and judging.

Pre-judging would seem to be a very normal process employed in order to assess a person/situation. Nothing wrong with that as one should not assume mal-intention.

Judging, OTOH, is the process of assuming you understand enough about another person or situation so that you can render an opinion. For this error, one should burn in Hell for the rest of time (which is exactly what happens).

I would say that it is probably about the extent of making judgemental biases. An extreme example would be when someone says, 'I don't like blacks- they are taking all the jobs,' This might sound over the top but it is one which I have heard many times in England. There are so many far more subtle ones and I would suggest that the problem is when people are not prepared to go beyond initial preconceptions.

It could be argued that most educated people have thought beyond this level. However, I am not sure that all the basic prejudices have been eradicated but become hidden. However, it is not just about race but about all aspects of difference. I think it is likely that slightly different groups may be on the receiving end of prejudice.

Of course, you or anyone else is welcome to say that in many ways prejudice, and the whole systemic imbalances of power have been addressed mostly. However, so far on the site no one has actually suggested this. Also, there have been a number of threads on aspects of difference, and two having been deleted has caused controversy. So, somewhere in the midst of the collective unconscious of this site, there may be some burning concerns. But the focus of mine is a bit more obscure because it is about the prejudiced mind and looking at ourselves.

It would seem to me that most "overt" prejudice is ignorance or fear.

We all suffer from ignorance to a great degree but it is fear that seems to cause people to become poor actors. Whether it is losing a job or losing one's culture, these fears are ligit and simply part of what makes us human.

I think it's pretty normal and natural to feel threatened by (whatever) as this provides motivation to do what needs to be done (to overcome and move-on). It's those who fail to do what is needed who continue to feel threatened and end up projecting their feelings of inadequacy on others (taking all kinds of forms).

I think that you are correct to say that fear is at the centre. I think that we are all fearful of difference and probably any loss, including the loss of personal privileges.

What kind of personal privileges?

Everyone has privileges in the structure of the social world, such as being male, white etc. In a way, we could say that the most disadvantaged could be the black, disabled lesbian. We live such hierarchical structures in a way in which these categories are almost invisible but they permeate life.

Thinking of the example of the earlier thread of the way in which men often feel treated badly in education establishments, this does need to be seen in the light of the whole way in which men were the elite in education in the past. This history of male dominance is being overturned and it makes some uncomfortable. I remember in sixth form English class how one boy decided to leave school because he just couldn't cope with our feminist teacher who went as far as calling God 'she'. This was quite interesting really in a Catholic Comprehensive school.

But of course there are situations such as in groups, in which people proclaim their disadvantages almost like trump cards. But, despite this it has to be remembered that such people probably have a history of being treated badly. And, it is complicated because there are also invisible differences. For example, I have seen disabled people objecting to so called able-bodied people using disabled toilets and they are making the assumption that all disabilities are visible. So, it is extremely complicated.

When I studied sociology, I was always interested in the way labelling occurs. I love the way in which Becker's theory of labelling portrays the way in which people, especially deviants are labelled as outsiders and this affects their whole identity, usually negatively. The whole way in which people are categorical as 'bad' or 'mad' has big consequences too.

So, I would argue that the whole way we are seen in social life and the way life involves power structures has major impact. Also, when changes occur some are going to react to their privileged position being challenged.

For example, I have seen disabled people objecting to so called able-bodied people using disabled toilets and they are making the assumption that disabilities are visible. So, it is extremely complicated. — Jack Cummins

This is a good point, and is a common prejudice: the refusal to give the benefit of the doubt. I saw a man in the grocer's recently who wasn't wearing a face mask. I immediately felt myself getting angry and had to tell myself off. Sure, he was probably just a git, but he might well have had a very reasonable exemption. You have to give people the benefit of the doubt: to not do so is to pre-judge.

Then the guy came and stood right next to me so I got to yell at him after all. All's well that ends well. (I get away with a lot having a posh voice in Manchester. People who'd otherwise pull a knife on me become catatonically confused. :rofl: )

This automatic reaction to think the worst of people when there are perfectly good explanations possible seems like a symptom to me. I think that has a lot to do with how we live and how much of our autonomy we have to surrender to live that way. We live in a world of strangers and that is not what we're built for. We feel helpless to make things right and that's not what we're built for either. There's a lot small print in our social contract that even the authors didn't notice.

Your example of the thoughts which can come into mind is an example of the way in which people can drift into prejudiced assumptions. You are able to stop and think about how the person may have underlying health issues.

You mention that you don't get yelled at because you have a posh voice. I have to say that at times I can look a bit of a yob. Even though I think white, I did get stopped and searched by the police on one occasion.

When people meet others for the first time, the whole set of assumptions they bring is interesting.I know many people who claim that they go by first impressions. To some extent, we use first impressions. If someone speaks to us and we don't feel at ease with them we are not likely to continue the conversation. However, it is a complex area because if people form impressed of others and aren't prepared to go to this it gives so much opportunity for prejudice to creep in.

This automatic reaction to think the worst of people when there are perfectly good explanations possible seems like a symptom to me.

I think that has a lot to do with how we live and how much of our autonomy we have to surrender to live that way. We live in a world of strangers and that is not what we're built for. We feel helpless to make things right and that's not what we're built for either. — Kenosha Kid

Nah. Bad faith and ill will are evolutionarily advantageous.
The social contract actully teaches us that it's good to think bad of people. If you can corner someone by thinking the worst of them, you win in that evolutionary struggle for survival/one-upmanship.

You speak of the importance of looking for the bad in someone. I would say it depends on what looking for the bad entails.

One situation in which you could consider the question is of an employer recruiting staff. Obviously, having chosen to invite certain people for interviews, which may in have involved some biase, we can think about the whole aspect of 'bad' played out in interviews. The employee has to seek to weed out potentially good employees. This will involve a certain assessment, which will be about the person's work history and attitudes among other criteria. This does involve perceiving potential problems like to trying to eliminate people who are lazy or careless. However, on some level this can go beyond that and involve prejudiced bias, against for example gay people or married women.

It would probably be difficult to raise an official complaint for not being selected for a particular job. However, the matter is different entirely once a person has been employed. If someone is dismissed from a job it could be down to the person's standard of work or conduct, or it could involve the prejudice of the employer. It is a grey area and so many complex industrial tribunals are based on the fine lines of this matter.

I would just add that you speak of the importance of seeing bad in others in order for evolutionary survival and one -upmanship. This is once again a difficult grey area, because where does one go in separating this from bullying.

Bad faith and ill will are evolutionarily advantageous. — baker

Actually they're not.

What's helping you win arguments and prevail?