Why are we prejudiced?

I’ll be the first to tell you I have my fair share of prejudices.

I won’t say what they are at risk of offending someone, but they’re there.

One of my friends was recently given an assignment in which she had to write an essay about her prejudices, why she had them, and where they might come from.
It got me to thinking.

Why am I prejudiced?

And where do my prejudices come from?

Obviously we’re not born racist, sexist, bigoted or prejudiced.

Why do stereotypes and snide judgments influence our opinions of people?

This is immediately creating for us an idea of who a person is and what they stand for before we even begin to know them, before we can really say anything about who they are as a person.

During one moment, we are learning 2+2, and the next, to borrow a stereotype heard often on this campus, we are wishing we were Asian so that we could more easily excel at math.

Beyond that, I know my prejudices and automatic judgments of people should not define how I think about them.

Even so,  why do I still get scared of big dudes walking down the street at night as I walk home? Why do I consciously let my prejudices influence my behavior, when I’m completely aware they’re irrational?

Why can’t I just let them go?

Perhaps because, over time, prejudices become so ingrained in our minds that they become mini personal ideologies. We use them to launch our viewpoints and opinions about everything and everyone.

I thought my friend’s assignment was interesting, to say the least.

We got to talking in depth about our less politically correct and more offensive and embarrassing views, like small homophobias, racisms, sexisms, and bigotries we share.

They’re ideologies we both know are wrong but that, all the same, we use to judge others and that we know others use to judge us.

While I don’t have an answer for why prejudice and judgment is our main launching point by which we see the world, I now somewhat know why I think the way I do.

I do what I can to stop myself from automatically disliking a person simply because there is something about them that is intrinsically different from myself.

I think these kinds of open discussions should happen more often.

It helped me, to say the least, to delve into the reasons behind my prejudices and made me really think about my own views.

Hopefully this will even change a few, for the better.

­— ewenning@indiana.edu