Voicing limited and qualified agreement with a bigoted stereotype

Great Debates
121

The OP specified stereotypes that are not true. Here’s the relevant part of the OP:

If “almost all X are not like that” then obviously it isn’t true. Pointing out that some small percentage of X are like that serves no purpose I can see other than to try to build up the stereotype by claiming that there’s truth in it.

If what the person wants to say is “some minority percentage of Black people are really good basketball players, and so are some minority percentage of people of all other skin colors” – that’s true enough; and I’ll be astonished if I’m promptly jumped on by others on this board for having said so. Nor, I note, has anybody been jumped on in this thread for having agreed that currently, in the USA, Black people are overrepresented in professional basketball teams.

But apparently what some on this thread want to be able to say is “there is truth in this stereotype because look at this handful of people it does apply to!” Which is at best misleading. And I really can’t think of any reason to do that unless the intention is to leave the impression that this stereotype is accurate – and, if also saying that all stereotypes have truth in them, to apply that impression also to even nastier stereotypes.

– I haven’t, while I’m at it, heard of statements such as “men are on average taller than women” being called “stereotypes” even when people leave the “on average” out of the statement; except possibly when in the context of other stereotypes being combined with it, as in somebody saying, for instance, “the stereotypical woman is small, soft-voiced, and not very bright” or “don’t worry your little head about it”. But even if “men are (on average) taller than women” is to be considered a stereotype – that’s still a very long way from either “there’s a kernel of truth in all stereotypes” or "almost all X are not like that, but . . . "

And yet people do that all the time. Do you really believe that people who think “Black people aren’t as smart as white people” don’t make that assumption about most Black people who they interact with?

And if a stereotype doesn’t (improperly) serve that purpose: what purpose does it serve?

Cite, please? (Not in context of some specific case, but overall.)

So is what other people say about them. And what other people say about them is in many cases also subject to massive ignorance about them.

122

Yes, and this is also true of race. For example, upon learning that Asians do better on the SAT in the US, white racists don’t decide that makes Asians superior; instead they say Asians are too conformist, or less creative, or something similar that allows them to maintain their feeling of superiority.

So far I’ve got that stereotypes are bad if they say something bad about a less privileged group, or if they say something good or neutral that might be ‘used against them’ in some way. Degree of accuracy is generally not seen as relevant.

Given that the whole point of stereotypes - in the wider sense - is to act as a mental shortcut, it’s more or less inevitable that they will be applied to individuals, particularly when people lack personal knowledge of the individual in question. The resulting unfairness is one of the bigger problems with them.

123

One prefixes the statement with “I’m not being racist, but…” or “I don’t want to sound bigoted, but…”

It doesn’t work, but that is how one does it.

124

Well, I disagree. A stereotype can be true even if it only applies to a small fraction of the group. Let’s try another: Jews are great at winning Nobel Prizes.

Absolutely true stereotype. 22% of Nobel Prizes were won by Jewish people, despite them being only being 0.2% of world population. And yet “Nobel Prize winner” is an infinitesimal fraction of any population.

Even when the specific outcome at play is limited to a small proportion, it doesn’t mean the factors leading to that outcome are also limited. Why are Jewish people so good at winning Nobel Prizes? Well, I dunno, but I’d suppose it’s because they have a strong emphasis on education, intellectual pursuits, achievement, etc. The reasons would be interesting, but regardless, they are more broadly applicable than just the Nobel Prize winners themselves.

Because it’s so obvious and innocuous that there’s never any reason to point it out. There is the data-driven fact of the matter. But there is also the stereotype, which every child figures out early on, which forms their belief about the groups. The stereotype happens to be accurate in that case.

Sure, and I’d never defend that. But that doesn’t mean the stereotype is incorrect. It means that people should be wary of generalizing to the specific, especially when there is direct evidence to the contrary.

Sometimes we have to talk about groups in a normal way without inserting dozens of caveats that are already understood.

125

The lack (or not) of personal knowledge is key. The mental shortcut is useful and justified when there’s a lack of knowledge. Otherwise not.

Men are more violent than women. If you’re walking alone at night, and there’s a group of drunk men ahead of you, do you try to avoid them? What if it’s a group of drunk women? I’d certainly avoid the first and not bother with the second. But at the same time, it would be absurd to claim that a woman in prison for murder is less violent than a man just because she’s a woman.

Is this sort of stereotyping unfair? Well, maybe, a little. But most of the unfairness comes from applying the stereotype in cases where personal knowledge is present. And that can be avoided.

126

People will come up with all sorts of justifications to discriminate, they’ll find whatever fig leaf they want. Factuality has little to do with anything.

If it’s that important to the posters here to claim stereotypes are true, then they should just go ahead and do it. I doubt the people they interact who they stereotype don’t already know how these posters feel about them

127

No, it’s not.
“Nobel prize winners are likely to be Jews” is the true(er/ish) stereotype. Do you really not see the difference between stereotyping one group (Jews) vs a different one (Nobel Prize winners)?

128

I disagree that it’s justified in general.

Avoiding the drunk men does them no harm, and merely inconveniences you. But that’s often not the case when you want to act on a stereotype. For example, it’s probably true that men aged 20-50 of a Middle Eastern appearance are more likely to be terrorists (even though, as per the OP, almost all of them are not). Strictly statistically speaking, disproportionately focusing airport security on this group might be most effective - but if you happen to be one, it’s extremely inconvenient, and unfair to be targeted for extra checks when you’ve done nothing wrong, for something that’s outside your control.

Similar problems apply to policies like stop and frisk, and to traffic stops. Even if it’s statistically more effective to target particular groups, it’s still unfair to the majority of innocent people who suffer inconvenience and feel harassed by such tactics.

Or look at employment. I doubt anyone would argue that someone who’s been convicted of a crime is on average going to be to make a worse employee than someone who hasn’t. But if all employers act on this, former criminals are going to be unable to find a job and support themselves.

Even if a stereotype is based on genuine differences between groups, it can still be unfair and harmful to act on it.

129

People have been asking why it matters: why anyone would want to talk about whether there’s any kind of truth underlying offensive stereotypes.

One reason is that it’s bad to gaslight the public by telling them they aren’t seeing what they clearly are seeing.

Another is that you can’t explain things if you refuse to talk about them. If someone believes a particular stereotype, and they turn on their TV or read a newspaper article and see evidence for the ‘nugget of truth’ that inspired it, they are going to feel the stereotype has been confirmed. You can’t introduce nuance or non-bigoted explanations for stereotypes without talking about this.

Thirdly, an accurate understanding of the world is important. Consider the fuss over predictive policing algorithms - used to target police patrols towards high-risk areas - and whether they are biased because they predict more crime in poor and minority neighbourhoods. It’s important to have a factual answer to this question if you want to reduce crime and make the police more effective.

130

Absolute nonsense as applied to Jews in general, as almost no Jews have ever won a Nobel.

“Jews are overrepresented as Nobel winners” is not remotely the same thing as “Jews are great at winning Nobel Prizes.”

I can see no good reason to have to talk about groups of people by using stereotypes that apply to almost none of them. Why on earth would you talk about Jews as if we were all Nobel winners? And talking about Jews as if we all had lots of money is actively dangerous.

And you may want to assume that all those caveats are already understood – but very often they aren’t.

If it’s “normal” among your social group to talk about groups using stereotypes that apply to very few members of the group – I strongly suggest re-thinking that. It isn’t “normal” among mine.

Using stereotypes is dangerous when used as a substitute for lack of knowledge of the individual.

I’d avoid both of them; if only because they might fall over into me.

And using reasonable caution around strangers, depending on the specific situation, ought to be applied to all genders.

Not only that, but if only or almost only such people are targeted by security, terrorists would just use blonds, children, women, and old people instead. It’s not as if they couldn’t find any such.

Probably depends on the crime. Someone convicted of embezzlement isn’t, I don’t think, significantly more likely to be a child molester, and probably vice versa.

131

And the thing they are clearly seeing is what exactly?

132

It sounds like they think we aren’t being realists about certain human characteristics.

133

That rather demonstrates the problem; in reality, the actual type of person most likely to be a terrorist in the US is a white male. But we characterize Middle Easterners as more likely to be terrorists because stopping terrorism isn’t the point; persecuting Middle Eastern people is.

134

For example, that black athletes are notably overrepresented in several sports. You only have to turn on your TV to see this is true. It’s unsurprising people come up with a stereotype like “black people are more athletic”, and they are hardly likely to change their minds if no one will talk about it.

135

Let me quote myself,

The people that come up with these stereotypes are not interested in changing their minds. The history of various ethnic and racial groups being overrepresented in all sports is but a search engine query away.
It’s unsurprising that people come up with stereotypes because, as we know, they want to stereotype the ‘other’.

136

From a recent opinion column re: “philosemitism” (emphasis added):

Lofty principles conflicting with on-the-ground ick at real-life Jews is basically the story of philosemitism in any era or incarnation. If you like Jews because we’re cosmopolitan, you’re going to lose it when you learn how many Jews (no more or less than anyone else) are deeply provincial and lacking in curiosity about the world beyond whomever they went to kindergarten with. If you imagine Jews are all like Hannah Arendt or Susan Sontag, what do you do when you meet one who owns exactly one book and it’s The Catcher in the Rye and she was assigned it in high school? Will you consider this a lesson learned, or will you be mad at her for not living up to expectations?

137

That too is a stereotype, and therefore by your own account has no basis in truth.

138

Pointing out that bigots are bigoted is a tautology, not a stereotype.

139

Yet again: nobody is being given a hard time on these board for saying that Black people are overrepresented in the USA in some sports. Multiple reasons for this have been pointed out in this thread; but “Black people are (genetically) more athletic” (and therefore, in many people’s minds, less cerebral) is not one of them. It’s certainly true that people won’t change their minds if they don’t have those other reasons pointed out to them; but they also most certainly won’t change their minds if you say to them ‘yes, this is a truth that backs up that stereotype’. It’s a fact – but it doesn’t back the stereotype.

Most people who repeat them didn’t come up with them. Those are all very old stereotypes. They’re just repeating them.

Some are repeating them because they’re bigots, and determined to be bigots. Some are repeating them because most of the people around them repeat them; and, like many people, they assume that most of what they hear from those around them is true.

And in a lot of cases that makes them into bigots, because bigotry is what they’re used to. Some, however, are capable of changing their minds. Sometimes bigots stop being bigots – it can happen. Sometimes ignorant people learn things.

But you can’t teach them that stereotypes are wrong by telling them that stereotypes are right!

140

There is one right there–a stereotype, that is. All black people are not crazy about watermelon. I have never purchased a watermelon in my life and seldom partake of them. In fact, in my experience, it’s whites who are the watermelon fanatics, not we.

Another thing that we have been accused of is inherent lateness. Also, in my experience (I am in show business), white people are the ones who are constantly tardy for almost everything. So, how did it become “colored-people’s time, or CPT”? It should be more rightly, “WPT, white-people’s time.” On the screen and in comedy routines, white men are always complaining about how long it takes their wives and girlfriends to get ready to go anywhere, making them usually late. For public performances, you see them arriving after the show has started, even when their own children are being featured. The way I see it, most unfavorable actions or behavior done by a person-of-color tends to get a negative connotation, whereas a white person doing exactly the same thing is justified or put in a more positive light. Like, if a black person happens to arrive late somewhere, they are operating on CPT, but when it’s a white person, they are only “fashionably-late” or they want to make an entrance. I just calls ‘em as I sees ‘em.