The Roots of Prejudice

PREJUDICE may have a number of causes.  Nevertheless, two well-documented factors are  (1) the desire to look for a scapegoat and (2) resentment caused by a history of injustice.

 As noted in the preceding article, when a disaster occurs, people often search  for someone to blame.  When a prominent  people repeat an accusation against a minority group often enough, it becomes accepted and a prejudice is born.  To cite a common example, during economic downturns in Western lands, immigrant workers are frequently to blame for unemployment-even though they often take jobs that most local people refuse to do.

But not all prejudiced stems from the search for a scapegoat. It may also be grounded in history.  "It is not too much to say that the slave trade built the intelligent edifice of racism and cultural contempt for black people,"  notes the report UNESCO Against Racism.  Slave traders tried to justify their disgraceful trafficking of human beings by claiming that Africans were inferior.  This unfounded prejudice, which was later extended to include other colonized peoples, still lingers.

All over the world, similar histories of oppression keep prejudice alive.  Animosity between Catholics and Protestants in Ireland goes back to the 16th century, when England's rulers persecuted and exiled Catholics.  The atrocities perpetrated by so-called Christians during the Crusades still arouse strong feelings among Muslims in the Middle East. Serbian and Croatian hostility in the Balkans was aggravated by massacres if civilians during the second world war.  As these examples  show, a history of enmity between two groups can reinforce prejudice.

Next time: The Roots of Prejudice - The Cultivation of Ignorance

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