Why Do We Form Prejudices?
The world is full of prejudice people, wether you accept it or not. We all base our opinions off of this this higher being that we all visualize in our minds. In a high school mind set, this would be the cheerleader, the football player, the popular groups. We tend to think of these people as bigger than human; flawless and with no personal trouble. This would be expressing a prejudice opinion. You dont know these people or what goes on in their lives. In reality, they have as much conflict in their lives as anybody does.
Regardless of what is said, if you are a human being, then there is no difference between you and the person standing next to you, across the room from you, across the ocean even. Our eyes are our enemies. We get to know people by simply looking at them. Nobody takes the time to listen rather than look.
We form prejudices as a way to view someone. We sort people into groups as a way to better see them. We don't know how to handle new people, so as we first meet them, we find something negative about the person to make ourselves feel better and know how to view them.
When in groups, people subconsciously start to act a different way than they normally would. For exapmle, Sports teams. We dont know the other team, but we know we need to hate them because they are a different team. We dont personally know them, or anything about them. But we are okay with our hatred towards them. We naturally don't like when something is different.
According to recent studies, 3/5 people form an opinion of someone within just 5 seconds of meeting them, based on appearance. And about 55% of a person's opinion of you is based on how you present yourself, or how you look. But why do we form these judgments of people based on mere looks?
Well, for one thing, it is simply human nature to judge others on their appearances. As people we automatically notice certain features of each other's looks, and our memory creates categories for them; it's just how our brain works. But where do these categorizations come from? Well, either you're raised to believe certain things about appearances, or you learn them from the media. For example, things like TV and magazines tell us what is considered "beautiful" or how to look, and make us dissatisfied with our own looks. And while some elements of attractiveness are universally accepted (such as symmetry in face, clear skin, hourglass figure in women), the media still pushes us to think a certain way about appearance. So therefore, those who have the look that is so often seen in the media are usually judged in a positive way, and those who are not tend to be judged in the opposite way.
Regardless of what is said, if you are a human being, then there is no difference between you and the person standing next to you, across the room from you, across the ocean even. Our eyes are our enemies. We get to know people by simply looking at them. Nobody takes the time to listen rather than look.
We form prejudices as a way to view someone. We sort people into groups as a way to better see them. We don't know how to handle new people, so as we first meet them, we find something negative about the person to make ourselves feel better and know how to view them.
When in groups, people subconsciously start to act a different way than they normally would. For exapmle, Sports teams. We dont know the other team, but we know we need to hate them because they are a different team. We dont personally know them, or anything about them. But we are okay with our hatred towards them. We naturally don't like when something is different.
According to recent studies, 3/5 people form an opinion of someone within just 5 seconds of meeting them, based on appearance. And about 55% of a person's opinion of you is based on how you present yourself, or how you look. But why do we form these judgments of people based on mere looks?
Well, for one thing, it is simply human nature to judge others on their appearances. As people we automatically notice certain features of each other's looks, and our memory creates categories for them; it's just how our brain works. But where do these categorizations come from? Well, either you're raised to believe certain things about appearances, or you learn them from the media. For example, things like TV and magazines tell us what is considered "beautiful" or how to look, and make us dissatisfied with our own looks. And while some elements of attractiveness are universally accepted (such as symmetry in face, clear skin, hourglass figure in women), the media still pushes us to think a certain way about appearance. So therefore, those who have the look that is so often seen in the media are usually judged in a positive way, and those who are not tend to be judged in the opposite way.
Yes, it is human nature to make judgments based on looks. And yes it is easy to be influenced by what the media tells us. But that doesn't make it right. In fact, it really doesn't make much sense to just decide what someone is like simply based on how they appear. When it really comes down to it, prejuidce is just labels and ignorance, and there is really no logic behind it. People should be based off their character; not their looks.