| From: | Tarek Okail Tarek_Okail@**********.com |
|---|---|
| Subject: | Roots of Prejudice and Racism |
| Date: | Fri, 21 May 1999 00:25:55 -0400 |
From my Social Psych. course:
Schemata - Concious and unconcious ways of looking at the
world. Cognitive shorthand that influences mental processes.
Person schemata - What do you think someone else is like?
Role schemata - How you expect someone to act given a par-
ticular role: waiter, cop, judge, etc.
Event schemata - What you believe should happen during a particular
event: getting a ticket, attending a wedding, in a
meeting, etc.
Self schemata - How you expect yourself to act.
You notice everything when you subconciously or conciously
form a schema, but you quickly pin down certain particular and
distinguishing aspects to base the schema on. (George smiles a lot,
Joe mumbles, etc.)
From then on, you tend to notice the reinforcing traits more
than the differential traits. Deviations are noticed, but are not
usually remembered *unless it affects you directly*. Pass George in
the hall and he's frowning, you won't remember it five minutes later.
Pass George in the hall and say "hello," whereupon he snaps at you,
you *will* remember that, at least for a while.
If someone later tells you about Joe's presentation and
mentions the fact that he was speaking clearly and distincly, you're
very likely to react with surprise. "Joe? I'm surprised. He usually
just mumbles."
And the next time you meet Joe, you won't think "He speaks
clearly." You'll think "Oh, here's the mumbler again."
There's a whole lot more under heuristics, but the basic
thrust of this can be boiled down to:
Once someone has an idea about "the way things are," they will
persist in seeing the world and interacting with other people accor-
ding to their perception of the world, and no amount of argument,
discourse, reasoning, or logic will ever get them to change their
schemata *unless they really, really think about it.*
This applies to *everybody* regardless of nationality, "race",
culture, or gender. Everybody. These schemata are why sterotypes are
so persistent; they fit right into the way we think, and are a very
fast shortcut we can use to form a schema for a particular person. It's
partly the fact that we just don't want to think, and partly the way
our brains are wired.
Does racism exist? You damn well betcha! Can we ever stamp it
out? No way in Hell!
Can we take a moment to think about our reactions and why we're
acting in certain ways with certain people? Yes, but it's not easy to
do, and it only works on the individual level. We may be able to reduce
and possibly eliminate our *current* prejuidices, given a hundred years
or so, but we will, inevitably, acquire and develop new ones. It's just
the way we are.
Sorry. I just had to rant, I couldn't keep it in anymore. Plus,
I just spent several minutes downloaded a hundred K worth of namecalling,
"Yes you did no I didn't", useless garbage posts. I felt I had to contri-
bute something useful.
A Woodchuck would be more welcome than continuing this thread.
Using this information about schemata could help develop your
NPCs personalities more completely. Heck, developing and writing down
your PC's own schemata will help flesh out your PC and improve your role
playing abilities. You know, that's such a good idea I think I'll start
using it for my characters, both NPC and PC alike.
Shadowmage
