Stereotypes, Prejudice, Discrimination, and Racism
Bias in society is expressed due to various reasons. Some of these reasons are rooted in stereotypes, prejudice, discrimination, and racism. The terms stereotypes, prejudice, discrimination, and racism correlate and are often used interchangeably. Subsequently, it is important to comprehend their definitions to avoid confusion and address the origin of bias that individuals face.
Firstly, stereotypes can be defined as oversimplified opinions about the characteristics, attributes, and conduct of particular groups or members of a group. They are also perceptions about how and why certain groups attribute together (Hilton and von Hippel, 1996). Stereotypes can be positive, usually towards an individual’s own group, and negative towards another group. Secondly, prejudice is defined as irrationally based (Pettigrew, Fredrickson and Glazer, 1982), attitude, usually negative, towards a certain group or members of a group (Nelson, 2016). Prejudice is usually an unfair prejudgment not based on any actual experience.
Thirdly, discrimination can be described as unequal treatment of certain individuals or groups (Pager and Shepherd, 2008). Consequently, it is based on various categories such as religion, age, race, ethnicity, gender, and other factors. Lastly, through a cognitive approach, racism can be described as biased consideration out of opinions about the inferiority of another race or ethnic group (Schmid, 1996). It is an example of both prejudice and discrimination used to justify inequalities against individuals by maintaining that one racial group is somehow superior or inferior to another. Accordingly, a dominant racial group maximizes advantages for itself by disadvantaging the minority racial groups.
As unfortunate as it is, stereotypic behavior is often observed in our daily lives. As discussed earlier, stereotypes can be based on particularly anything such as dress code. For instance, a famous professional football player dressed in baggy clothes with unkempt hair and a beard went to a street full of people. He did not gain any attention from most people as he interacted with only one young boy. This ignorance is because he seemed like a beggar or a homeless person and nobody wanted to be associated with him. After revealing himself, everybody was surprised, started calling out his name, took pictures with him, and even followed him around. The young boy, on the other hand, received an autograph. This is a perfect example of stereotypes. The people around this celebrity player had a generalized opinion that he was just a homeless person just because he was dressed in the way he was dressed.
Stereotypes bring in discrimination, especially when there is a negative attitude towards persons or groups. In the scenario explained above, the professional footballer was not treated equally by many when he was dressed as a “homeless person” compared to when his identity was revealed. The “homeless person” was ignored, while the famous footballer was praised. The situation could have been different if most people were not stereotypic about his dress code, and most would have gotten autographs like the young boy. Had the stereotypes behaved differently, the footballer might have acted differently towards them, and maybe they would have all gotten autographs instead of only the young boy.
In conclusion, stereotypes, prejudice, discrimination, and racism are terms we should understand. They are all non-ethical practices that are encountered in peoples’ daily lives. People face a form of bias in one way or another throughout their lives, therefore, understanding the form of bias enables individuals to understand other people’s behavior towards them. Additionally, understanding what they are is important because it is a good start in eliminating all bias forms to better societies and promote moral behavior.
References
- Available at: <https://courses.lumenlearning.com/wm-introductiontosociology/chapter/stereotypes-prejudice-and-discrimination/>
Hilton, J. and von Hippel, W. (1996). STEREOTYPES. Annual Review of Psychology, 47(1), pp.237-271.
Nelson, T. (2016). Handbook of prejudice, stereotyping, and discrimination. 2nd ed. Psychology Press.
Pager, D. and Shepherd, H. (2008). The Sociology of Discrimination: Racial Discrimination in Employment, Housing, Credit, and Consumer Markets. Annual Review of Sociology, 34(1), pp.181-209.
Pettigrew, T., Fredrickson, G., and Glazer, N. (1982). Prejudice. Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press.
Schmid, W. (1996). The Definition of Racism. Journal of Applied Philosophy, 13(1), pp.31-40.
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Question 
Stereotypes, Prejudice, Discrimination, and Racism
1. Explain the difference between stereotypes, prejudice, discrimination, and racism.
2. Briefly describe a situation that you’ve encountered in which stereotypes governed an interaction between two or more people (if you’ve never experienced one, you’re welcome to look at the news—please include a link).
3. How did stereotypes affect the situation? How could the situation have turned out differently?
https://courses.lumenlearning.com/wm-introductiontosociology/chapter/stereotypes-prejudice-and-discrimination/
