Curious expectations

A rather curious experience in the outside world makes me write this post. I’ll write a post about teaching some other day. In some ways, this incident has little to do with my being a teacher although I do wonder how I can get some sort of a positive message across without sounding as though I am preaching or trying to force people to act, behave or think in a certain way.

Somehow, I had innately imagined that individuals who have felt marginalized or victimized in some way or the other – great or small, medium or slight – experience greater empathy and/or sympathy if they also have the benefit of being able to reflect (that is they are not fundamentally incapacitated in their mental abilities) upon their victimization and marginalization in society, which could either be at the institutional or at the individual level. Thus somehow I have almost “expected” people who have faced some sort of discrimination to be sensitive to different forms of discrimination. Thus, I would think that I would be more sensitive to the stigma faced by other groups, say for instance the sort of ridicule the physically handicapped face (especially in India) or what the elderly may face simply because they are seen to belong to a particular social category, especially if I have been viewed with negative bias because of my religion, race, sex, national identity or ethnic status. It’s the idea of abstracting the concept of discrimination and seeing how it can affect people across different groups.

But it doesn’t seem to work that way. People may be acutely aware of how they or their ancestors because of their social membership in a particular category have been subject to torture or insensitivity and how that has had adverse effects on them as an entire social group – but they don’t seem to feel that being prejudiced in some form or another against an entire social category is also a form of discrimination. I do agree completely that people can have personal likes and dislikes, and as long as there is no abuse or undesired violence involved or force or compulsion – I don’t see why we can’t just let human beings be who they are without trying to subjugate them. And I will always remember that famous line, which in my own head runs something to the effect of, “I may disagree with what you say or how you see some things but I will always defend your right to be…” I can quite see how behaviour and particular forms of behaviour and actions that human beings engage in can cause rift and strife and plenty of unpleasantness, yet I don’t think I have ever understood how active hate, indifference, and apathy can be directed against entire classes of people. Oh, I know it exists – that doesn’t surprise me. It’s just that after so many years of formal education I haven’t gotten any closer to understanding the factors or the causes or the processes behind human hate, indifference, and apathy.

On the other hand many people whom I’ve come across in my personal life and academic life have been such militant equalizers with their claim that “all human beings are the same. Bring them up the same way – and they’ll be all the same – dammit!” that they have made me roll my eyes all the more (since these people were/are of my same age group and have had more experiences, or so I would think). Also I’ve come across people who have talked so much about being the “victim” or else are so obsessed with social inequality, marginalization, discrimination and patriarchal structures that they don’t seem to see that sometimes individual level explanations are not only indispensable but that discrimination does not and cannot explain all the ills that exist in society and that patriarchy certainly is not responsible for all that is wrong with the womenfolk of today or the world of today. They seem to be completely unaware that certain things have just gone too far.

Fairly recently, I remember people (who are in gender studies and have gotten their PhDs) say “Figure skating is a flagrantly sexist sport.” Ice skating as a sport apparently serves some sort of a patriarchal interest and indulges some sort of a male perversion and was being held up as an example of institutional discrimination and male domination. I had replied and quite cheerfully that a) both men and women participate in figure skating b) it is an aesthetically appealing sport c) I liked watching it every now and again when I could and had always watched it as a kid and d) I was neither a pervert nor a male and hadn’t been either – not in this lifetime at any rate. I don’t remember whether I’d been subject to the patriarchal hegemonic discourse lecture that time around.

For some students who are specializing in gender or queer studies or race - everything in society can be boiled down to patriarchal domination or discrimination based on sexual orientation or racism or some form of a combination of all these ills. The ones who see this priceless combination of discrimination (race, gender and sexual orientation) are viewed as being utterly remarkable because they have been able to locate all the important social links that cause all the ills in this world. Some graduate students have even told me that according to them – all White students should experience absolute guilt for their treatment of Blacks (African-Americans). It doesn’t even matter whether these White students have never felt anything but goodwill towards Blacks in general and are also aware of how racism functions in the current United States society. They must still experience guilt and feel the absolute shame. They must carry the guilt of their predecessors.

Now I am not a big one for guilt. True – it has its functions and its role in some situations but endless guilt or absolute guilt does not appeal to me too much. Also, I don’t see the point in actively shaming someone who has not actively done anything wrong apart from belonging to a particular social category (I have never seen it worth my while to call all men beasts or all women idiots or all Whites racists or all African Americans victims). I have also come across my share of White students, who believe that racism is completely a thing of the past while class discrimination has never been an issue in the United States (and there are traceable reasons as to why they believe thus) while being completely aware of gender discrimination and also being aware of the need to address it (for this awareness, I have not been able to locate any clear reasons). It isn’t possible, I know, to always change how people think (and I don’t think I’ve ever been able to do that) but I know I made a bit of progress when I asked students to think about the school system, the tracking system, the location of schools in particular neighbourhoods and the available resources, the taxation system, and differences in access to education (no matter how flawed the education system is) and how different opportunity structures are blocked because of some forms of stratification. I got some reviews from students where I was labeled a “racist” and one where I was called the “worst instructor” the student had ever had but I got a couple of students who by the end of the semester really did seem to have shifted perceptibly even if infinitesimally in how they viewed stratification and social identity markers and social categories of people. And I certainly didn’t shame or accuse anyone.

And all this is not to say that I don’t for a minute think that I am above reproach. I am a member of this community of social "scientists" (!) after all – and I don’t really have any answers to any of the meaningful social questions and am indeed just as confused about some issues as I had been when I’d formally started studying this discipline some 15 years ago. Furthermore I know how embarrassingly loud of a militant I was and have been and can be even now if pushed a bit or if I get it into my head that I am being pushed.

Stereotypes are common, and not always are they false. But about that some other day. The problem is when I start treating individual human beings in a certain way based on a stereotype that I carry in my head. Differences amongst human beings are also something that simply are. And I almost want to insert a footnote at this point saying: quite apart from social identity markers (such as race, creed, caste, religion….) – there are also individual differences which are no longer talked about because such talk isn’t seen to be politically correct (popular writers thankfully enough, write about these very sensible issues in a no-nonsense manner - but of course we, fancy academicians are too good for the likes of them!). Human beings differ in their talents, abilities, in their habits, in their predispositions, in their likes and dislikes….

Sometimes, like it or not, people may also be prejudiced. Prejudices for the most part are based on stereotypes. This is a good time for a Soc 100 quiz question to get my own frames in order: what is prejudice? In short, it is the collection of often irrational and preconceived notions (which are sometimes resistant to change even in the face of new and incoming information) regarding an individual but more often regarding a group of individuals based on some social identity. Prejudice, much like stereotypes, can be both positive and negative. But whereas positive stereotypes exist for both out-groups and in-groups – prejudices more often than not remain positive for the group one is in, that is the in-group (more likely than not), and negative for the other group, the out-group – whichever group that may be.

But more importantly (at least for now), what is the most sensible way to tackle that form of prejudice and/or bias given that people will have their own tastes and preferences? I’m not asking them to like or dislike groups of people but I do want to get them thinking why it seems so hard for them to “socially accept” a group of people. In different semesters there are different things that evoke very strong sentiments. This time it is sexual orientation, which I don’t remember being a problem in previous semesters. But how does one address the issue? Especially when one happens to be the instructor in a class where half the class just seems to be innately aware that non-acceptance of and/or active discrimination against people who belong to a minority group is unfair and where another half is not so sure about the same, and don’t see anything wrong about not-accepting or being suspicious about or being rather wary about an entire category of people? And it’s not as though the students in the second group are insensitive or non-intelligent otherwise. They participate in discussions and have made many pertinent points so far….but I am rather perplexed at this point.

The irony is not completely lost on me. All along I had been quite sure that a group of people who belonged to the same social category would respond in the same/similar way (as though belonging to a particular social category bestowed on them some identical characteristics, tastes, and dispositions) to certain social processes (in this case legal and/or social discrimination). Why on earth should they? It's been an eye-opener to me for sure....and in more ways than one.