Let me start with a little story. This week I went to register my residence in Steiermark and since we had some time, I asked the official about conditions under which it was possible to find a job here. Only when he started to explain to me that as a citizen of a certain east-European state I face some restrictions, did I realize that he had lumped me together with “them”. I felt rather offended that he had mistaken me for a citizen of this particular country and it was quite difficult for me to correct this clerk in an indistinct tone and ask him about my possibilities once again.
But then I started to think. I OFTEN do the same – judge people, lump them together, think that my country is better than other countries but do not pay attention to individual characteristics of people living in those “other” countries...

Now I want you to think a bit about your ATTITUDE TO OTHER NATIONALITIES, CULTURES, MINORITIES. You may wish to ANSWER just one or all of these QUESTIONS, or include any personal EXPERIENCE – feel free to do so. Please, be AS SPECIFIC AS YOU WANT to be.

1. Do you think you are sometimes biased to other nationalities? If yes, when you you realize it? Does it affect your behaviour? How?
2. Can you think of any reason why it is so? Where this bias comes from?
3. Is there anything that helps you to overcome this bias?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/27/2012 11:36AM by jasminecka.

This is a very tricky and difficult issue. I'm not sure but probably it is a human characteristic feature to "like" classifying people. Sometimes I also find myself judging people, not really on the basis of their nation, religion or culture but their character, although honestly I do not really know the person. And when I think of my childhood (I grew up in the countryside) I still remember my grandparents locking ALL the doors of their house when a black person selling some pictures approached their property. As a child I immediately deduced from their behavior that I should probably "avoid" these people and I was even afraid of black people until my parents told me that they were "normal" people with just a different color of skin. I think that during your childhood you get a lot of input from your family and process that in some way. To some extent this can influence your way of thinking and your behavior.

I'm possibly treading on thin ice with my comment, but When it comes to biases I think that a lot of Austrians quite clearly distinguish between "good" and "bad" foreign people and cultures. This is then reflected in people`s attitudes and behavior, as you noticed during your registration. I also made a quite similar experiences in France and Spain.

I had always thought that the older and the more educated we people get, the more we know about other cultures and the more we get rid of prejudices. But if I consider the popularity of certain "right-wing" political parties in elections in different countries, I get quite worried.

I hope my statement is not too confusing. I know it's not a real answer to your questions.

Hi Karin,
thank you very much for the response. I really appreciate you've shared your personal experience, don't worry about my questions - they are just topics which rose up in my mind after the registration and I was interested in biases.

You've made a similar experience? You've been the person who was treated disrespectfully or you've realized similar things?

Thank you for your response once again.
Evka

Hi Eva,

You've got a quite interesting topic here. You already know my attitudes towards people in general, but I might as well share them with others, too.

Referring to your first question: I honestly believe, or at least I hope, that I have always treated people (regardless of their religion, race, age, etc) with the utmost respect. Because I'm coming from a country with a very long, perhaps too long, history of violence and war I often get asked "How do you feel being a part of all that?" All I can say is that I do not identify myself nor do I agree with the politics of my country, thus I do not feel ashamed as an individual. Perhaps that is the main reason why I only "judge" people's character, scrutinize them as individuals, not as a part of a group. And frankly, it makes me, as well as other people, more comfortable and relaxed, knowing that there are no prejudices between us.
Thanks for this rather interesting question!

if you all didn't already see this: [www.ethnoconnect.com] you should take it. When I did, I really realized how many assumptions I make about entire groups of people. When you finish and it tells you the "right" and "wrong" answers, I began to wonder why I picked certain groups for certain characteristics. I found it was much harder for me to pick the middle easteners category because I haven't had much personal experience with middle easteners.

I think being here in Graz is an excellent place to realize how diverse people really are outside of the groups we usually put them into. I mean, I really can't even believe that this test has one group for "europeans" - an entire CONTINENT!

Something interesting I read a few days ago was about the representation of minorities on television. This was not exactly what I read, but I just found this from googling: [www.media-awareness.ca]

To me, it is apparent that at times our prejudices lead to self-fulfilling prophecies on both ends. For example, if I am constantly "told" that african americans are violent, then I will only remember evidence that supports this theory (such as mugshots on the news of black men). I think it even works the other way around - limiting ourselves only to the boxes people put us in (woman, white, american, etc)

hey everyone,

this is a very interesting topic and it has triggered so many responses already... I'm also Austrian and found that I agree with quite some things that Karin said above already.

I also often have the feeling that in Austria (and maybe it's the same in other countries) there are some "good" foreigners and "bad" foreigners- at least some people seem to see it this way. The "good" foreigners appear to be those people that come to Austria from rich countries and who often have a good education already. I guess they mostly come from other Western European states or from the US. Those that are seen as "bad" foreigners usually come from poorer countries. They also often have another skin colour, but not necessarily all of them. It is very critical to divide immigrants into these two categories and also, I wonder: why is it that when a person from say Africa or Arab countries comes to Austria that their education does not seem to matter? Yes, most of them are rather poor and do not have a very high education, but there are exceptions. Yet, they are all thrown together into one pot. The family of a friend of mine moved fled from Iraq to Austria when she was still a baby. Her mother had been a teacher back in Iraq and her father a lawyer. I think when they finally came to Austria they had to start from scratch, even though they had a very high education. Her mum worked for a carpet company, fixing carpets and I think her dad became a language teacher, but I think not in a school. I still cannot believe that those people had to start at the bottom of the social ladder in Austria, just because they came from one of those "bad" countries. Nevertheless, the younger generation has aimed very high: all my friends' brothers and sisters have good jobs- one of her sister studied at the Technical Uni in Graz and the other one is already a doctor. My friend also studies medecine. I'm glad they are all so successful.

There's one other thing I wanted to talk about. Karin mentioned above that right-wing parties are quite popular at the moment and that she always thought we would gain more knowledge during our aging process and thus see people with less prejudices. I do hope that this will be the case in our generation, I really do. We are used to constantly being in contact with other cultures, we know a lot about them and we travel a lot. I believe that the "old" generation now- that of our grandfathers and grandmothers- at least in Austria, has not had a lot of experiences with other cultures and if so, they were no peaceful ones like they are now. Also, they do not know anything about people from Asia, Arab countries or Africa. Then there's the media which keeps telling us that Africans all sell drugs in Stadtpark and rob old women and they become afraid of them. I really do believe that the problem old people are having with foreigners is largely due to the fact that they know they are different, but they do not know anything about their cultures. They only see and hear what the media are saying about them. They have not experienced how it is to have such a person as a friend or in your class and how interesting their cultures are. They are faced with cultures that are unknown to them and I think this makes them afraid.

Now, I've written loads. I would be interested whether you agree with me or have other opinions. These are just my opinions and I would be interested to know more about yours. Have you also experienced that old people are often against foreigners? do you feel that my explanation makes sense or have you other ideas about it?

Responding back to the original forum post I do think that I am biased towards other nationalities. As much as I try not to be and would like to think that I judge people based on a clean slate I know that that is not true. I think that alot of stereotypes that we grow up with and thing we see in the media cause us to have automatic predispositions towards people. It is awful to have to admit but there are certain judgement that you just cannot shake about other nationalities. I have found that the best way to overcome there and have a more open mind is to get to know people from that "group" and inevitably these negative biases will be disproven.I don't think that these biases affect my behavior but they definitely do affect the way that I think. Being in Austria has vastly improved my ability to meet people and have an open mind. So I do think that the more experiences you have where you have to be open the better you become at it.
I think that being an American I have one the the biggest biases against me when I go into a new country. I am always grouped by my nationality and people assume things about me that are not correct. I remember meeting a few Scottish guys at a bar here and I had trouble understanding their accents so I had to constantly ask them what they were saying. One ended up telling me that I was just another stupid American girl. I was shocked by this bias. 1. I didn't realize that all Americans were thought to be stupid, and 2. What did this possibly have to do with my gender?
Instances like that definitely help me to work as decreasing my biases because I realize how bad that made me feel. I hated being judged based on the group that I belong to and so I am making a concerted effort to not make anyone else feel that way.

Nike LeBron Shoes the most classical recognition degree is limited for Dunkman series don't note, today officially released back to LeBron and new topic. The whole match colors changed back to the most representative black for spindle, the other part in detail with fixed and fluorescent green for foil, whole has a low-key murderous look feeling, is absolutely LeBron fans will be the focus of the chase after hold in both hands. Want the of LeBron people must pay attention to.

Lebron IX as James ninth signature boots, regardless of appearance or whether appearance or technology, it has very main level! LeBron 9 in addition to the choice of the color has with different think of opportunely, pooled NIKE currently the most advanced technology and according to James requirements carefully build, with strong coating as well as shock absorbers, Lebron IX Shoes is the highest level of work in NIKE basketball shoes, Chinese version of the particular color in October the first stage, designer Jason Petrie and LeBron James for consumers carefully to create works, both functional and story, to the details of the intentions of inking more into James soul.