Why are people prejudiced assholes?

EDIT: I'm really just asking about origins of prejudice (psychological and evolutionary points of views) + Ways to mitigate biased decision making in an organizational setting.

Title says it all. Why do great many of us become prejudiced assholes?

Is this just human nature? Is this a product of some cultural reinforcement? 

Can we at least shape a culture of being aware of our own prejudices? 

What are best ways to mitigate prejudiced way of thinking (ie. Groupthink) at an organizational level? At a community level? 

Surely some of us must have good understanding of psychology and organizational behavior.

EDIT: Thanks to @Ozymandia and @financeabc, this turned to another political shitshow where fools just talk back and forth. Thanks a lot. World is a better place. Not really. This was supposed to be a post about organizational culture assholes.

 

I have never understood why prejudice is a bad thing. It´s helpful and shields you of potential danger. Can it overreach and make you miss chances? Yes, absolutely, and as educated people we are called to constantly doubt ourselves. But - IMO - you should give your gut the place it deserves, which is at the core of all your being, and then let the head watch over it.

...and the Truth shall set you free
 

Unfortunately, I think that it's deeply rooted in our biology and psychology. Your brain immediately tries to categorize and group whatever it encounters. The cave man, who was totally open to seeing if that grizzly bear or wolf was friendly, did not survive. Our brains are not trained to see shades of grey but rather "wolf is bad....run or fight"

 

Children are taught not to take candies from strangers for a good reason, to the point that it has become a common sense quote. 

Survival bias is lindy. 

Never discuss with idiots, first they drag you at their level, then they beat you with experience.
 

lots of people are legitimately extremely judgmental. not to be rude or try and call anyone out but there are less genuinely good people in the world than you would think that there should be. reflect on your life experience and think about if you are a good person, what you can do to try and be a better person. if you are even feeling bad about something bad that you did then you are better than most people, if you apologize for doing the bad thing then you are better than a lot of people, if you never do the bad thing again they you are probably a much better person than most people.

 
Milton Friedchickenman

Title says it all. Why do great many of us become prejudiced assholes?

Is this just human nature? Is this a product of some cultural reinforcement? 

Yes, it is human nature.  Since the dawn of recorded history, people have been writing about how they're civilized and their neighbors are disgusting unwashed savages.  Humans naturally want to have outgroups - modern research backs this up all the time, people want to have a group of nominally like minded individuals, and that means discriminating against outgroups.

Can we at least shape a culture of being aware of our own prejudices? 

It's called being "woke".

What are best ways to mitigate prejudiced way of thinking (ie. Groupthink) at an organizational level? At a community level? At a national level?

Personally, I don't think it can be done, especially not in a society as litigious as that of the United States.  Especially in the Trump era, where even the concept of truth or fact are areas of dispute, I'm not sure we can actually achieve a balance between tolerance of differing opinion and a regard for the safety of both individuals and society as a whole.  For example, as a Jew, it makes me kind of uncomfortable to hear Rep Marjorie Taylor Green endorse crazy conspiracy theories blaming Jews for [insert something here], and being supported in it, no less.  Is it immediately threatening to my person?  No, of course not - but this is little more than a new Protocols of the Elders of Zion, which were used (among many other factors) to justify the Holocaust.  When does tolerance of personal opinion become less pressing than ensuring people's safety?  We know where her story leads, because we've seen it before.  When that kind of delusion becomes essentially the norm in public discourse, how can you even begin to discuss the topic of prejudice?  If we can't agree on fact, then we certainly aren't going to be able to discuss opinion.

 

Ozymandia

For example, as a Jew, it makes me kind of uncomfortable to hear Rep Marjorie Taylor Green endorse crazy conspiracy theories blaming Jews for [insert something here], and being supported in it, no less. 

I am not sure why but Rep Marjorie Taylor Green's behavior is so dumb that it does not bother me all that much. I mean, do you have a Jewish laser?   I guess I should be a little more concerned because there are probably people who agree with her.  What really pisses me off is the anti-Semitic crap that pitcher Trevor Bauer supports. He basically supported one of the Soros conspiracy theories.  I am glad the Mets did not sign him. 

 

financeabc

I am not sure why but Rep Marjorie Taylor Green's behavior is so dumb that it does not bother me all that much. I mean, do you have a Jewish laser?   

I mean, do you think Jews leaven their matzo with the blood of Gentiles?  Not so long since that was a pretty commonplace belief.  A couple years back I had someone on this very site tell me that Jews are in full control of the international media and financial systems.  It's not obvious if you don't look for it but these are widespread conspiracy theories, and people like Representative Green are just the boils on the surface of the underlying disease.  We have had three quarters of a century where anti-Semitism and the organized, systemic murder of Jews has been frowned upon, compared to ten times that length of time beforehand where it was commonplace.  You think that kind of history of organizational and communal prejudice is so easily expunged?

 

Trying to blame Trump (notice how you cite "Trump era") for another representatives off hand remark to Jews is beyond silly. Let's not forget that Kushner, one of the most powerful people in the Trump administration and also his son-in-law is a practicing Jew.

Array
 

IncomingIBDreject

Trying to blame Trump (notice how you cite "Trump era") for another representatives off hand remark to Jews is beyond silly. Let's not forget that Kushner, one of the most powerful people in the Trump administration and also his son-in-law is a practicing Jew.

I wasn't correlating anti-Semitism and Trump.  It's one of the few stereotypes he plays into a relatively positive depiction of (though no stereotype is ultimately "good").  I was merely trying to make the point that the modern right wing as epitomized by Mr Trump has made "expert opinion" a dirty word, and told their supporters that whatever tinfoil hat conspiracy they want to believe is automatically superior than whatever the "mainstream" says.

My concern with Mr Trump is his well publicized criticism of truth, fact, and unbiased analysis.  Which isn't to say people who dislike him, myself included, don't suffer from bias, but I do not think we've ever had a public figure of his standing tell their supporters that any negative news they read about him is untrue, and anything good is true.  That's beyond a disputation of fact or differing opinion, this is uncharted territory.  Even folks who made egregious claims in the past at least turned to nonsense justifications, rather than just deny criticism is valid in any form.

There is literally no way to have a functioning society if we cannot even agree on something as basic as a fact.  Which is why just saw a bunch of conservatives try to overthrow democracy and install a dictatorship, and watched the majority of conservative politicians enthusiastically support it, or at least refuse to condemn it.

 

Trump is a hardcore Zionist bro, and if not he personally, then his slimy son-in-law. Besides, Jews ARE overrespresented in Finance, Law and Media, but I think that´s just because they´re good at talking, writing, negotioating, that sort of stuff. Useful for any society, of course.

...and the Truth shall set you free
 

BigKahunaBanker

Trump is a hardcore Zionist bro, and if not he personally, then his slimy son-in-law. Besides, Jews ARE overrespresented in Finance, Law and Media, but I think that´s just because they´re good at talking, writing, negotioating, that sort of stuff. Useful for any society, of course.

Jews are overrepresented in finance, law and media because they go to elite schools, take risks, assimilate substantially and suck at sports.

 

Just wanted to echo on tension between WASPs and Jewish folks on Wall Street:

Theres an article on the NYTimes called “No Longer a WASP Reserve” that talks about discrimination on Jews in the industry and how barriers were finally broken by the early to mid-1980s by this group. They had no diversity programs back then and no BB or EB firms that existed back then would want to take em (with the exception of talented or connected people). Especially MS who was the biggest culprit of them all back then. Food for thought for anyone thats interested.

 

Agree on woke people being prejudiced. Its unreal how much they get away with because they have a deck filled with victim cards. They love to cancel people but in reality the crosshairs should be turned on them. I hope one day it is. I'm a mid-2000's liberal which now is 2021 Center-Left I guess, and I think woke bullshit is killing the party. Even with all the idiotic bullshit SOME Trump supporters and the Q-Anon fanatics say, I actually think I'd have an easier time just having a discussion with them than I would with a far left woke idiot. I'd have an easier time talking to a brick wall that was willing to spend hours digging through my internet history looking for something dumb I said in 2006. They're actually worse, which is just mind-blowing to me. Obama even thinks they're stupid. They are causing dems to hemorrhage votes, and if we classify November/December as a success, we are gonna get fucking railed in 2022.

Dayman?
 

Think this is a couple reasons:

1) Trust is how humans survived. Essentially if humans didn't develop a fine tune sense for what they could trust vs. not trust we would have died out a long time ago (those who trusted too easily died out). So some level of tribalism is programmed within out DNA where we search for things like us (color, race, gender, etc) as a signifier of what is 'knowable' and therefore 'trustable'. Why people hire from their own gender / race / same name / etc

2) As a result of (1) we dislike that which is 'Other'. Reason why social programs work in EU is greater homogeny. If I'm white and I'm subsidizing another white person it seems fair as I could see myself in that person. But if I'm white and subsidizing someone who's black, there's a greater degree of skepticism as there is less of yourself you can see in that person in terms of being in their shoes 

3) Related to tribalism, humans survived because we congregated in groups. If we didn't, individually we could have been wrecked by mercurial Mother Nature. So those humans that did form groups survived, and that DNA / mentality is with us still. When we choose who we form groups with, we look for markers of trust / familiarity 

4) Humans are egoistic / narcissistic creatures. When something goes wrong in our life / something not to our liking, we tend to blame outwards. Who are the easiest targets? Those who are not 'like us'...and esp in a country which is majority one race / religion it is easy to blame the minority (i.e. tribalism). Nothing unites people more than a common enemy..which is why you will ALWAYS see some group persecuted across the globe

Think making the world a better place is a noble idea and in the short / mid term you can see good results. However, mean reversion dictates that in the long run (100+yr) there will always be social issues / people who are persecuted or treated poorly for whatever reason as a group. It is naive to believe that things like slavery / indentured servitude are ever really gone forever. Hell, even genocide is still going on in many parts of the world despite our whole mantra of 'never again' post WW2.

Humans are innately neither good nor bad. It's ultimately a question of incentives, you create the right system and people will by and large act well...and vice versa. But again because the state of man / anything we create is impermanence, nothing (good or bad) will last forever. So prejudice / hate will always exist, just as kindness / compassion. 

 

Finally someone decided to make a serious and educated reply. I really appreciate this.

Essentially "prejudice" is a baked-in mechanism that got ingrained into our biology and/or reinforced through culture?

How do you think this plays out in organizational decision-making settings? Essentially, prejudice = bias and can lead to an organization making wrong judgements when it comes to making important strategic, financial, or even hiring decisions. I'm fairly interested in what mechanisms have been developed to mitigate these risks.

 

Yes, I'd say "prejudice" is largely baked into our DNA as natural selection eliminated those who were too trusting. And trust is established via a number of ways incl verbal signals / non verbal signals (aka why body language is so important and some say up to 70-80% of communication is non verbal) / physical markers (race, skin color, etc). Culture reinforces this predisposition...prejudice can occur on many different vectors as well. Simply because on eliminates prejudice on behalf of race doesn't mean there won't be prejudice on basis of social class / religion / height / weight / etc. We are all prejudiced in some way on some vector, our predisposition towards it makes it simply too easy to absorb implicit biases...which are reinforced constantly as we grow up (i.e. hear comments of how poor people don't work hard / black people sell drugs / muslim people are terrorists / etc) from both other people and disparate events across the world. At the end of the day, narratives are powerful more so than statistics. One need only look at the U.S. where 'white' terrorism actually exceeds Muslim terrorism but if you ask the majority of people what they think of when you say terrorism, it is Muslim people / jihad / bin Ladin / etc

I am not an expert on how orgs control for this. Was having a conversation w/ a buddy and I came to the conclusion that if it's at the org level that you need to address it as an issue, it is already too late. Earliest point to address is in childhood, everything from your education system to your parents & people you surround yourselves with (a function of how they grew up) and gov programs (i.e. if gov did a better job of producing more high skilled workers in minority groups, these prejudices would naturally minimize). The step that is more in our control is the organization's founding itself. If it's an old boys club / old white guys then to some extent the implicit hiring biases are in the firm's DNA...very hard to change a firm's DNA vs. consciously being more open minded near the inception phase. So I'd bet companies started 10yrs ago are way more diverse than those started 30yrs ago (even controlling for pop diversification), although I haven't seen the data.

In terms of what you can do for hiring, I do not think quotas are doing any favors. If I'm not in a 'quota' group for more senior roles, then I'd resent being passed over for promotion for being too vanilla ('I' as in anyone not part of the quota). If you hire by quota for only junior positions, chances are they won't make it to upper levels. Forgot the exact stat but for IB, women / URMs hired as analysts where quite diverse at that level but those who made it to associate & above were mostly all white / asian males. 

Trainings are bs. I have friends who conduct bias trainings (race / sexual orientation / etc) and even they admit that it's bs and unless there is real effort by the senior leadership itself there is rarely ever meaningful change. 

I apologize here as I only know of what doesn't work here vs. what truly works (aside from a ground up rebuild / shift in gov public expenditure & education). This isn't an area where I really have expertise, others probably have more to add here

 

financeabc

If OP did not want a discussion on politics, he should not have put political click bait in the title.  The topic was initially very poorly written without a coherent main idea.

I LITERALLY asked in the OP about "implications in organizational behavior".

You can rationalize things all you want but you know you didn't even read the OP.

There's a reason why you get so much shit on WSO and it's this kind of attitude. 

 
Most Helpful

Milton Friedchickenman

financeabc

If OP did not want a discussion on politics, he should not have put political click bait in the title.  The topic was initially very poorly written without a coherent main idea.

I LITERALLY asked in the OP about "implications in organizational behavior".

You can rationalize things all you want but you know you didn't even read the OP.

There's a reason why you get so much shit on WSO and it's this kind of attitude. 

I did read the original post and it was very unclear with a terrible title. If you put something about organizational behavior in the title, it might have made some sense.  You tried to fix it but at that point, it was too late.  I know you think very highly of your own intellect but if you do not know why I get a lot of shit, you are not as bright as you think you are.  Please use some common sense.  It is not rocket science.

 

Because white people in America are realizing that Hispanics are on pace to replace them as the majority in the next few generations. Get ready for the majority-minority life.

 

What are Hispanic people? I just arrived in America less than a year ago so most of my understanding is from the television. But as far as I can tell America only has white people and black people, and roughly a third of them are LGBTQ+. Was I mistaken?

A recent immigrant would know more than this. 0/10, get better content.

 

Because white people in America are realizing that Hispanics are on pace to replace them as the majority in the next few generations. Get ready for the majority-minority life.

Youre not even answering my question..

Go back and read what I'm actually asking. Thx.

 

It's not really "prejudice" because we aren't pre-judging them. What people think of as "racism" in the classical sense is just an expression of our innate pattern recognition (13=50) and fight or flight instincts (crossing the street to lessen the chance of getting mugged), which evolved over hundreds of thousands of years.

The early Soviet Union and Maoist China both tried to eliminate these instincts to bring about "equality", resulting in the deaths of tens of millions.

 

It's not really "prejudice" because we aren't pre-judging them. What people think of as "racism" in the classical sense is just an expression of our innate pattern recognition (13=50) and fight or flight instincts (crossing the street to lessen the chance of getting mugged), which evolved over hundreds of thousands of years.

The early Soviet Union and Maoist China both tried to eliminate these instincts to bring about "equality", resulting in the deaths of tens of millions.

Go back and read what I'm actually asking.

 

Clearly a bunch of people showed their prejudice towards the word 'prejudice' but I guess that's besides the point.

I think Thomas Sowell and Amos Tversky & Danny Kahneman have some good ideas around this and/or similar subjects.

"Sowell distinguishes between three types of discrimination: using known individual characteristics (Discrimination 1a); predicting unknown individual characteristics from observed group characteristics (Discrimination 1b); and arbitrary discrimination that ignores the individual characteristics of the decision-subject altogether (Discrimination 2)." - https://www.independent.org/publications/tir/article.asp?id=1362

In regards to Tversky and Kahneman I think a lot of people have read about them but specifically the representativeness, availability, and anchoring heuristics I think play a strong part in prejudice. 

As to why these things exist, I guess it's just evolution.

TLDR: evolution, even of a social nature, is bound to take a long time to occur.

 

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