Prejudices are what fools use for reason
The quote: “Fördomar är de okunnigas argument” or “Prejudices are what fools use for reason”.
I really agree with Voltaire on this one! If you look at the world today prejudices really are what fools use for reason.
It is really easy to have preconceptions and judge but I think that this is really based on lack of knowledge or jealousy. Think about it! When you do not know, you guess instead according to your own personal experience, therefore prejudices are a big part of the modern society.
Just think of all the things/people that you might miss out on!
For example, if you see someone on the street, let’s say that it is a blond woman with big breasts and short skirt, what would you do? I think that all of us would judge that person in some way, because we all do it, we judge people and other people probably judge us as well. So, I think that we can all agree on that this is wrong, we do not want people to judge us so why do we judge them? I mean ever since we were very small we have heard from our parents/teachers that “You should treat people the way you want to be treated yourself. ”Why don’t we learn from this? One of the explanations is simply the personality of every individual person some of us have more prejudices than others. Another explanation is that our brain constantly is trying to categorize the things we see, hear, smell etc.
What can we do to prevent this? I think that every person has to look to themselves and think “am I a person who use a lot of prejudices?” but this might be hard for some of us because sometimes it might be easier to find faults I others instead of ourselves.
Voltaire used this argument to fight prejudices at his time and today we might as well use it against SD (Sverigedemokraterna). I think that the quote “Prejudices are what fools use for reason” really fits in here and in their political view. What do you think?
//Hedvig
Dear Anonymous Blogger,
you have definately chosen a very interesting problem to discuss.
I enjoyed reading your post, and the example of a blond woman is quite understandable :) !
True, we all have 'schemas', which affect our perception of other people or their opinions.
It is easy to judge someone, not really knowing what he/she is like.
I would lie, if I said that I have never put somebody to a specific box, without actually getting to know that person. However, I can say that my opinions about others change very often - I TRY not to categorize people, since not everything can be noticed at the first sight.
Keeping an open mind is challenging, especially while learning new things - when I don't understand I might just say it's stupid or boring. But, as you wrote, it is simply based on lack of knowledge. Maybe it is also a way of coping with the unknown - my mind trying to connect information skimms my memories :)
Well, Voltaire noticed this 'mechanism' hundreds of years ago and it did not only fit into his times, his era - it is also a perfect match to the world we live in today!
I agree with you. The society today is almost just build on prejudices. But one lovely thing with prejudices are that they can change very quickly.
And as you say it is easy to judge. One reason for why we use prejudices may be that we are curious about others, we want to know things about the people around us and then we use prejudices for "relaxing" so that we do not need to try to find out how the people really are like. Basically we want to feel power and control over the people around us. Maybe that is why we never learnd form "treat others as you want to be treated"
Really good entry. Who have written it? :)
Really good and interesting article Hedvig! :)
I totally agree with you about that we very often judge people even before we have get to know them and I think that this is because we are afraid and want to get a better self-confidence by judging others, which would make us feel like we are better. With that I don't mean that I use to judge people on a bad way, I just know that it is easy to feel very small if people are judging you on a way that makes you feel bad.
I knew it was Hedvig! I felt it.
I agree with you Alexandra. That it is very easy to feel small when people judge you. Maybe it's just us that cares too much about what other people think about us because we always want to be the best. And by judging others we feel better, as you have written. I usually don't judge people (or I do my best to not judge), but I think we're judging without thinking of it.
Thank you all so very much for all the nice comments :D
Good reference to SD!
I think as well as Voltaire and you that prejudice is ignorance. So if we think about it, why do we really have SD as a part of our parlament? Because this statement just proves that they are not smart, and are the swedish people that dumb to vote for a party that stupid? Or maybe the swedish people are not educated well in this matter. I think that it is our job to think about this issue and prevent it from happening(even though SD is already in the parlament). I think a lot of people think and feel the way you do Hedvig, and so do I, but there are still a lot of people who do not seem to understand that you should not "judge a book by it's cover". One solution is that we should start teaching kids in school that prejudice is wrong. This is my opinion.
A well-written article and good references. Nice job!
Awesome blog post, Hedvig!
I agree with Linnea that we're all probably judging people without thinking about it, since we all have our schemas, but we really should try not to judge people based on e.g. their looks.
I loved your reference to SD! If you'd think like SD, and would think that all muslims were suicidebombers, you would really miss out on a lot in life. I do think it's sad that a lot of well-educated immigrants in Sweden are forced to have badly paid jobs, e.g. driving taxis or cleaning. A lot of well-educated immigrants with doctor degrees who are experts within certain areas only get bad jobs, because of prejudices against e.g. muslims. This really is a loss to our whole society.
And Kimia, hopefully the Swedish people will see now that SD are good for nothing, and that they will never get into the parliament (translation?) again!
Again, nice job Hedvig!
Nice Article Hedvig! :)
I agree with you and your thoughts about Voltaire's quote. I think that it's a bit sad that Voltaire said this for such a long time ago and nothing (or maybe something) has changed! Shall we ever improve on this point, to stop judging people and things?
But as Voltaire said "it what FOOLS use for a reason", and I think his right at this point, as more knowledge and experiences you possess as fever prejudices you have, or? I at least think that people who are not that clever often have more prejudices than those who are cleverer.
About SD's connection with the quote, in my opinion people who vote for SD (the ones I know) with many prejudices are not the brightest person. Which also support Voltaire and his thoughts!
Good article Hedvig!
I agree with your thoughts and as many others have said your reference to SD was really good!
I think that we all sometimes judge people to early, and that is sad.
It is a loss to our society (like Lia said) and even on a lower level like us "ordinary" people can be hurt by prejudices.
Even though it is in real life very hard sometimes to not be prejudiced, we should all try to do our best and be openminded.
I'm so happy that you all have the same oppinions as me, and again, thanks for all the nice coments!! :D
I'm so happy that you all have the same oppinions as me, and again, thanks for all the nice coments!! :D
I don't agree with you at all Hedvig! No, I'm just joking :P I agree to 100%! I think we all are too quick to judge people just by looking at them or hear them say one sentence...
I like the connection to SD and agree with the comments above =)
When we meet a new person I think that we should try to think like " A stranger is a friend you don't know" and you don't want to have prejudices or judge a friend so why should you do that to a stranger?
Really interesting and nice entry Hedvig! =)
I don't agree with you at all Hedvig! No, I'm just joking :P I agree to 100%! I think we all are too quick to judge people just by looking at them or hear them say one sentence...
I like the connection to SD and agree with the comments above =)
When we meet a new person I think that we should try to think like " A stranger is a friend you don't know" and you don't want to have prejudices or judge a friend so why should you do that to a stranger?
Really interesting and nice entry Hedvig! =)
I agrre with you for 110% we judge people because we do not know enough about it. I loved that you wrote " You should treat people the way you want to be treated yourself´" I juste love that sentence. I think that we judge people because we want to seem better then the person we judge. It is just like the Qoute " Karma is only a bitch if you are".
