Stereotypes, Scapegoats, and Prejudice
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Contents |
Description
Conservative pundits are using prejudice, scapegoating, and stereotyping against liberals. The situation is serious - see analysis below. My suggestion is that maybe if we simply embarass them for using these tools, it might have an effect. What do you think?
- Conservative: "You goddam liberals are all latte-drinking elitists."
- Liberal: (In angry voice) I'm Jewish. For a hundred years, my people have to listen to crap like "Jews control the media," and "Jews are perverts," and "Jews are elitist powermongers." And finally, we think it's over, when all of a sudden, it's "liberals control the media," and "liberals are perverts," and "liberals are elitist power-mongers," and the whole cycle of prejudice and scapegoating starts all over again. I thought it would end someday, but no.
Status
Quality
Origin
The prejudices are mostly fed by Coulter, Hannity, Savage, Limbaugh, etc.
Talking Points
Counterpoints
Are you a sports fan? Then you're an elitist. All athletes (and Nascar teams, etc.) are a severely selected elite, and your rooting for them is propping up elitism right in front of your children.
Sightings
Analysis
The analysis below is partially based on:
- Howard Zinn, "A People's History of the US"
- Thomas Frank, "What's the Matter with Kansas."
A great deal of conservative power derives from the stereotypes they create: Latte-Drinking liberals, Liberal Elitists, etc. They are skillfully creating a form of prejudice. Prejudice is a powerful tool.
Several hundred years ago, racism came into existence, not by accident, but for a purpose. The rich landholders were greatly outnumbered by the poor whites and the black slaves. The poor whites and the black slaves were natural allies: they were both oppressed by the rich. There was a distinct danger that the two oppressed factions would team up. Together, they would have been unstoppable.
To protect themselves, the rich spent a huge amount of effort convincing the poor whites that the black slaves were evil, corrupt, stupid, and morally decadent. They succeeded in promoting this lie. This prevented the two factions from ever teaming up and defeating their common masters.
Meanwhile, here in the 21st century, working class people in the cities and working class people in the rural areas are natural allies. There is a distinct danger that we will team up and take down the rich. So the rich have convinced the working-class people in the rural areas that the working-class people in the cities (the liberals) are evil, corrupt, stupid, and morally decadent. They call us "perverts," they call us "rat-bastard communists," they call us "traitors." In fact, they call us any dirty word they can think of, but it hardly matters which word. Evil, perverted, morally decadent, whatever. They used all of them to keep the poor whites angry at the blacks. They will use all of them to keep the rural workers angry at the city workers.
The way racism finally began its spiral into oblivion was that those who opposed racism made a point of belittling and humiliating the racists. The racists eventually learned it was wise to keep their mouths shut. In so doing, they stopped spreading racism. Though this is an extremely slow process, it's gradually working.
