Ending Prejudice: Is Closing the Intelligence Gap the Answer

In today’s society, we face prejudice every day in many forms. Most people in today’s society have either been victims of prejudice or are guilty of exhibiting prejudice towards others.

This document is a critique on the Paul Bloom persuasive speech on topic “Can prejudice ever be a good thing?” Paul Bloom has presented this talk at official Ted conference and it was featured at January 2014. Paul Bloom is a professor of psychology and cognitive science at Yale University. Paul Bloom has a different opinion about prejudice. He said prejudice is often natural and rational thing. He discussed several stories and examples along with pictures in this Ted talk. In this document the author will critically review few points mentioned by Paul Bloom. The first point he mentioned that stereotyping can be good for the people. The second point is how the skin colors of people increase prejudice or biases. Finally the author

It has been thoroughly thought over what current topic or issue that people experience in most environments today, at both a micro and macro level that would be able to be examined and have come to the decision of looking at the most widely discussed subject, prejudice. All people are affected by prejudice in one way or another and it can impact on people's lives depending on what form it has taken. Also to be able to acknowledge that all people can be prejudices and see this is the first step to overcoming it.. The question that has been decided upon is that of “What types of prejudice do we see commonly today and how do they affect an individual at a micro and macro level?”

The prejudice dilemma is exasperated by the distinctive treatment black people receive from the world, consequently strengthening the feeling of mediocrity in the colored community and forming their negative perspectives on whites. As Jablonski noted, associating “skin color with inferiority has been one of the most powerful and destructive intellectual ideas of all time, leading directly to slavery, civil war, and, more recently, segregation and apartheid.” Racial discrimination still causes hardships suffered by many people. Wilkins expresses deep concern regarding racial integration “not only because of the past but also because of the future.” Even though the former segregation laws have been done away

Prejudice is explained and illustrated with examples deriving from culture and treatment of African Americans and how society perceives them to be. The definition of Prejudice is, “An unfavorable opinion or feeling formed beforehand or without knowledge, thought, or reason”(Dictionary.com) The majority of humans tend to judge individuals by appearance rather than personality. Prejudice and appearance are prevalent in Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein as well as today’s culture which has consequences regarding race, age, religion, etc.

Prejudices exist in every measure, against every person, and everywhere across the world. People are inclined to judge without reason, and often hold conviction to the initial judgment made. Despite worldwide attempts to decrease these preconceptions, people must suffer through being the target on very frequent occasions. In the U.S., occurred the Civil Rights Movement as well as the movement to end Women’s Suffrage. This did not eliminate all biases against those groups, nor did the Americans with Disabilities Act. People are still isolated because of physical

Imagine living in barracks, starved, then gassed because of your religion. Getting accused of raping someone because of your skin tone, then getting put in prison. Or getting spat upon because you’re a Jew. All of these things occurred at some point in history, and we are shown what this is like through novels, plays and book such as; “To Kill a Mockingbird”, “The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian”, “The Merchant of Venice”, and real world occurrences such as the Holocaust. Today I will be talking to you about the ways that prejudice is portrayed in all four of the novels, plays and historic time marks.

Standardized testing has been ruling over the lives of students, making or breaking them in their education without fair judgement. Tests like the SAT and the ACT count for way too much when applying to colleges, which in turn limits the student 's capabilities to thrive in an environment that would benefit them. There are many problems within a standardized test that deems them to be unreliable as a true test of knowledge. Although designed to test groups of students on intelligence, standardized testing neglects to fairly acknowledge the abilities of each unique student which reflect their true capabilities.

Racism and racial stereotyping are constructs that has been around since the beginning of the colonization of America. It’s a notion very prevalent yet undermined by skepticism. Many would believe that a nation such as the United States of America has progressed from such a hideous perspective, however, their existence is once again escalating. We see racial profiling and discrimination portrayed in various forms throughout our daily lives. Whether it be something simple as segregated neighborhoods or schools to things such as minorities being discriminated against during employment opportunities. It’s apparent that the barrier placed between blacks and whites is something affront yet learned racism in its entirety. There’s an underlying connection between racism and anxiety of black individuals causing them to turn to their own rather than seek sympathy from opposing races. This brief synthesis analysis will draw connections to this generalized statement aforementioned to elucidate on how perspective of minorities changes over the course of their lifetimes.

Most common form of prejudice, in the United States at least, is in between racial groups. Unfortunately, racial prejudice is so prevalent in the Western society. I believe most people think of themselves as unprejudiced these days, even myself. Sometimes we didn’t realize that we have expressed indirect forms of prejudice, ones that are subtler. Example in the American society could be when white people

here was actually a psychiatrist or psychologist who worked at the board and got sick of the implications that in the 1970s he devised his own standardized test called the Black Intelligence Test of Cultural Homogeneity. He devised a subsequent standardized called the son of a Black Intelligence Test of Cultural Homogeneity. Or B.I.T.C.H and son of a B.I.T.C.H test. On these standardized test whites scored far below African American students. Why, well this psychiatrist more or less was pointing out that standardized test were made up of a series of biased vocabulary and assumptions often related to class. He had basically done what the makers of the SAT had done but in reverse. So for instance, a question on it might be “catching wood is to firearms as police as the dozens is to:” and then you would have 4 choices. Without knowing what all those terms mean, you are guessing and you will be slowed down by not knowing that vocabulary and it is a timed test. The black-white test score gap does not appear to be an inevitable fact of nature. It is true that the gap shrinks only a little when black and white children attend the same schools. It is also true that the gap shrinks only a little when black and white families have the same amount of schooling, the same income, and the same wealth. But despite endless speculation, no one has found genetic evidence indicating that blacks have less innate intellectual ability than whites. Thus while it is clear that eliminating the test score gap would require enormous effort by both blacks and whites and would probably take more than one

Despite global increases in diversity, social prejudices continue to fuel intergroup conflict, disparities and discrimination (Amodio, 2014). What exactly is prejudice tendencies and how can one avoid it? One of the most common types of prejudice is racial. Racial prejudice is based upon negative preconceived notions of select racial groups with the assumption that all members of a particular racial group can be categorized with the same negative characteristics (Gassner & McGuigan, 2014). To better understand prejudice I took the “Test Yourself for Hidden Biases” questionnaire on race. I have to say that I was not impressed with how this test was used to find out if you have unconscious prejudice towards African Americans. The test

Standardized, merit-based assessment also disadvantages minority and low socioeconomic status students because of its presentation as a measure of ability. The performance of both black and low socioeconomic status students depends upon the context in which the test is administered. If tests are presented as measures of ability, these students tend to perform lower than their more advantaged peers; if tests are presented as general non-diagnostic studies, they perform equally. As one of over 100 examples, when administered questions from the Graduate Record Examination under normal testing circumstances, low socioeconomic status students answered an average of 8.90 correctly, compared with 12.30 for their high socioeconomic status peers. When presented as a general laboratory study, the scores were 11.46 and 10.89, respectively (Croizet, 2008). Such differences arise due to social anxiety and stereotype threat, the fear of confirming the supposed inferiority of a social group (Croizet, 2008).

People around the world face prejudice everyday. Prejudice has been around forever. They voice their opinions and through that comes with discrimination. They are criticized for their race, gender, or even how they act. They might not do anything wrong, but the way other societies and regions view them, they might have different opinions of how they act. Some people have dealt there way through prejudice, while others have to keep fighting for what they believe in or do. A single person might not even know who or for what they really think about someone or thing until they actually see it. In To Kill a Mockingbird Tom Robinson, Boo Radley, and Atticus Finch faced prejudice in their town for being ‘different’ or ‘weird’.

Prejudice is a burden that confuses the past, threatens the future and renders the present inaccessible. (Maya Angelou) By definition prejudice is a preconceived opinion that is not based on reason or actual experience. Prejudice to others is hate, judgement, and evil. The effects of prejudice are shown in the novel The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, the novel To Kill a Mockingbird, the play The Merchant of Venice, and the tragedy known as the Holocaust. Prejudice affected all people differently, but one thing is true for all; prejudice is crippling and disables those who experience it from being who they truly are and doing as they please.