Biases are inevetable. No matter how hard you try, some part of your opinion will already be predetermined depending on the way you’ve been raised, and the expiriences you’ve had.
Of course, this is not to say that biases are always a bad thing. On the contrary, biases sometimes fuel passions in issues that are important.
However, many times, biases can be blinding and can prevent you from seeing things the way they truly are.
I’ve I were to mention the biases I have, I would point out these:
[ul]
[li]If I know a person is deeply religious, I will not take there viewpoints on anything as serious as a person who is not “very religious”.[/li]
[li]If I’m talking to a person who had a PhD or any other academic title that may stand out, I often belittle that person in thinking that they are “too smart” (in a bad way) and I almost always assume that this person is particularly blinded by the fact they have titles.[/li]
[li]Not particularly proud of this one, but I also tend to take the opinion of men on issues not relevant to relationships, more seriously than I do women.[/li]
[li]I tend to think that the things I read are more up to date and more “correct” than things other people tell me.[/li][/ul]
I probably have a few more, but these ones stand out.
So, what biases do you have, that may cloud your objectivity?
I used to assume that anyone who didn’t go to college was either lazy or stupid. My husband is a plumber who didn’t go to college, so I obviously got over that one.
Currently, I will think less of a person who:
[ul]
[li]Doesn’t read for pleasure.[/li][li]Only reads romance novels.[/li][/ul]
The first one especially applies to people who are dissmisive about it. “Oh, I don’t read.” spoken in a tone that implies “How silly, why would anyone want to read for fun?”. The second one only applies if they don’t read anything else. I can understand enjoying something trashy every now and then (hey, I like Anne McCaffrey). But if that’s your primary source of entertainment, I’m going to think less of you.
I am going to get labelled as a racist perhaps, but regarding driving…
I live in a predominantly immigrant area. And after two and a half years here, I believe I can predict the continent that the driver of a badly-driven car comes from, before I see the driver, just by the style of error they make.
Very slow, meandering across lanes, no signals - African.
Very slow, generally keeping in lane, uses signals, but dithers at junctions - Chinese.
A bit faster, but no signals used, squeezing the car around obstacles into gaps that are IMO too small for safe negotiation and/or into the face of oncoming traffic - Indian subcontinent.
Ridiculously fast, no regard for road safety or pedestrians, no signalling, slamming on brakes from high speed to park diagonally wherever they like - young male of Pakistani/Bangladeshi origin.
(Disclaimer, this is not to say there aren’t a load of good immigrant drivers, nor that native English people don’t exhibit these particular characteristics - it’s just I have observed a trend, that I fully admit may be confirmation bias. And the last one is often just young men in general; but most of the young men round where I live are from these areas.)
I will admit that I’m suspicious of every Indian (Asian, not American) that registers on aa Web site i run. About half are spammers, and among the other half, only a small percentage post. When they do, the vast majority will usually post a homework question in really awkward English, and it’s often of the “Tell me everything about a certain subject chop-chop” variety. Something like …
“my nameis the sanjay i Am from india i have class need answer please asking you to tell About quantumphysics and All its theries i demand ,that you do kindly do the needful And give me the informations Speedily.”
(No, I don’t run a physics-related message board.)
Really, I’m surprised the SDMB didn’t get any Indian homework posters, even during the P2P free trial membership era.
Driving: around where I live, when someone is driving and accelerating slowly, and not changing lanes, they’re usually black women. I feel guilty when I pass by someone doing 20 in a 35, peek over expecting to see a black woman, and find a white man behind the wheel.
Rednecks: ugh. When I find myself working in an area where most businesses are related to motor vehicles or construction equipment in some way, in buildings that are made of corrugated metal, I assume the worst; politically very conservative, “get the hell off my land” types, women who are kountry kitschy types that will send glurge to any email address they can find, and a populace that can’t appreciate nuanced solutions and only listen to feel-good soundbites.
I agree. I can’t help it, but I think a little bit less of people that don’t read books. Now granted, I’m not a person who reads War and Peace every other week for fun, but I have specific authors I enjoy and I just can’t imagine how people can’t like to read and let their imaginations fill in what the author is describing.
I do think a little less of people who don’t read. I don’t like people who are dismissive of something even though they don’t know the slightest thing about it. I also think less of whiners.
Although I like to look at a handsome man, I usually assume that he is kind of a dick. I know that it’s an unfair of me, but that’s what this thread is about.
One of the following is posting to an English-language message board: elmwood, random indian guys. You decide!
Anyway, it’s not like he said “I would answer their questions if they would only speak better English!” He merely remarked that their English is awkward.
My dad (who is Indian) occasionally bemoans the racist yobbos who used to accost him in Liverpool when he was 20ish, and still accost him in London (only with “go home, Paki!” and the like instead of broken bottles and bricks) now that he’s sixtyish.
And yet, he once got cut off by a BMW when we were driving through… Islington, or somewhere… and looked over at the cutter-off a few minutes later when we pulled alongside and said, “Typical. He’s black.”
I was only about 13 at the time, but it made quite an impression on me. Such hypocrisy in somebody I admired so much. That’s when I realized that everyone is a bit racist.
Feh. Foreigners (by which I mean people from non-English-primary countries) learn English because they have to. Well, they don’t have to, but if they want to enjoy about half the world’s literature and video content it helps.
Hell, I speak about as much Hindi as you do even though I have relatives (who I saw quite often at one point) who can’t speak English. Honestly, once I could identify food and say thanks and stuff like that there was no incentive for me to learn more.
elmwood (presumably) doesn’t speak another language because there isn’t much point.
I’ll admit that my estimate of someone’s credibility as an authority on anything drops significantly when they utter the words “I seen so-and-so…” instead of “I saw so-and-so…”. It just smacks of white trash hick.
Same goes for someone who insists on posting/emailing with no caps, crappy spelling, lack of punctuation, or (my personal pet peeve) uses “lol” as often as they use periods. Even if my face-to-face dealings with this person have shown them to be a reasonable and intelligent individual, I’ll automatically downgrade them several points in both credibility and perceived maturity.
