Gosh. I must read for typos.
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Racism is a result of poor psychological functioning
(375 Posts)Steve Taylor, a senior psychological university lecturer has produced an article which outlines how racism may develop, and the 5 stages leading to it.
“ Research shows a link between prejudice and poor psychological functioning, including poor relationships with insecurity and aggression. This can often be traced back to a disturbed and insecure childhood. Other research has shown a link between racism and anxiety, demonstrating that people become more prejudiced during challenging times.
More generally, studies demontrate that when people are made to feel insecure or anxious, they are more likely to identify with their national or ethnic groups. This enhances their self-esteem and their sense of identity, as a defence against insecurity and anxiety.
There are clearly social and economic factors that encourage racism, such as hierarchy and inequality. But the above research suggests that racism is largely a psychological defence mechanism against anxiety and insecurity.”
The 5 stages
1. L“the process begins when a person lacks a sense of security and identity, which generates a desire to affiliate themselves with a group. This affiliation strengthens their identity and provides a sense of belonging.
What’s wrong with this? Why shouldn’t we take pride in our national or religious identity, and feel a sense of brotherhood or sisterhood with others who share our identity?
2. Because group identity often leads to a second, more dangerous stage. In order to further strengthen their sense of identity, members of a group may develop antagonism towards other groups. Such hostility may make the group feel more defined and cohesive, as if they can see themselves more clearly in opposition to others.
3. A third stage of the process is when members of a group withdraw empathy from members of other groups, limiting their concern and compassion to their peers. They may act benevolently towards members of their own group but be indifferent or callous to anyone outside it. The withdrawal of empathy turns other human beings into objects, and enables cruelty and violence.
4. Fourth is the homogenisation of individuals belonging to other groups. People are no longer perceived in terms of their individual personalities or behaviour, but in terms of prejudices about the group as a whole. Any member of the group is a legitimate target and can be punished for the alleged transgressions of other individuals from the group. In contemporary terms, any asylum seeker can be punished for the alleged crime of an individual asylum seeker.
5. Finally, people may project their own psychological flaws and personal failings onto another group, as a strategy of avoiding responsibility. Other groups become scapegoats, and consequently are liable to attacked or even murdered. People with strong narcissistic and paranoid personality traits are especially prone to such projection, since they struggle to accept their personal faults, instead searching for others to take the blame.
In other words, racism is a symptom of psychological ill-health, a sign of anxiety and of a lack of identity and inner security. Psychologically healthy people with a stable sense of identity and security are very rarely (if ever) racist. They ultimately have no need to strengthen their sense of self through group identity.
The Conversation
16/9/25
Whitewavemark2
Talking about football hooliganism - apparently the atmosphere amongst much of the crowd was just like the football crowds of the 80s - white mainly working class males - many drunk - attacking the police .
That’s. Interesting because I was in the car n Sunday morning, listening to Radio 4.
A journalist (I didn’t catch his name ) said he had been at the Saturday demonstration and that, apart from a small group of that n ious trouble makers, the bulk of the people he interviewed were what he the the ‘middle”.
Not out to make trouble but there to be express their concerns at negative impacts of large numbers of immigrants placed their own localities. The overwhelming view was frustration that nobody would listen when they tried to speak of their experiences.
The journalist said that he had attended many demonstrations in the course of his work so felt qualified to comment on the overall tenure of this one.
brilliant
David49
Whitewavemark2
Talking about football hooliganism - apparently the atmosphere amongst much of the crowd was just like the football crowds of the 80s - white mainly working class males - many drunk - attacking the police .
The police were there to keep supporter of the opposing team apart so why are you blaming the police!?
Er - sorry what?
Can we please be clear what we mean by 'racism' - a word that is thrown about all the time. Racism is surely the belief that one race of humans is in some way inferior to another, and acting on this belief in some way detrimental to that 'inferior' race. It is not 'racist' to object to a hostel of males of military age from a culture very different from one's own being established on one's doorstep. It is not 'racist' to say our country cannot cope with any more immigrants that are not contributing to our economy and who are receiving better care than our own needy. Besides this, 'racism' is not the only unfairness that is perpetrated. People are bullied for many reasons and often have no way of defending themselves because they do not belong to some vocal minority. I would also say that the most damaging case of arrant racism I have come across concerned an English girl in a Welsh school, who was mercilessly bullied and excluded by her peers, purely because of her race. But of course there is obvious 'racism' at the head of our country, hidden in plain sight, in a highly privileged 'Royal Family who have their place simply because of genetics! Racism, unfairness, cruelty - they can be found everywhere and I do not believe we should be blinded by the dramas in the news and the 'love to hate' public figures.
Feeding racism is in the interest of some. Farage doesn’t want us looking too closely at him so encourages the fear of the foreigner.
Allira
So how would you interpret these statements?
People with with strong narcissistic and paranoid personality traits are especially prone to such projection
racism is a symptom of psychological ill-health
In other words, racism is a symptom of psychological ill-health
I wonder what the views other psychologists might be on the subject?
Are they? My mother is mid-nineties and has “strong narcissistic and paranoid personality traits” which possibly were contributory to her sectioning (twice) in the last few years with psychosis. Thank the Lord for the care staff staffing her unit, 80% from various countries of Africa (she was there long enough for me to get to know them) and she is not racist at all. They all loved her too (once she was on her medication haha!) and she found them great - no mention of anything to do with where they were originally from or anything. She was there for months.
Another great slur on those with mental illness.
In later life we moved to a village which was made up of all white people. The neighbour next door went to a city college ( multi raced) and was aksed to write a story about her young life. So she wrote it from the perspective of growing up in a white town. She was labelled a racist by the lecturer - she was not . The lecturer gave the setting for the essay ie young life . So sometimes the guidelines for an essay or speach make it look like you are a racist of sexist .
No one is really interested in the causes of the malaise.
I certainly am, as it appears that these are universal and timeless issues. As is human nature.
It's very difficult to discuss the whys and wherefores on here when posters are shouted down for being irrational or hysterical.
Most people do not routinely think in an explicitly rational manner, and evidence from psychologists suggests that emotion often motivates thought, rather than obtructs it.
Until we acknowledge that those who engage in emotional thinking on here are also actually quite healthy, happy, and successful people, then these threads become narrow and quarrelsome.
I thought your OP was interesting, maybe News and Politics was not the best category for it to be analysed and discussed, because fewer GNetters will enter this domain?
foxie48
Allira Recruitment and selection has always been an area where people could exercise their prejudice. Your man at the council was prejudiced against "furriners", probably someone with a foreign name would not have even made the cut to be interviewed. As I've said on previous threads, I used to train senior management in ensuring their recruitment and selection procedures did not contravine existing laws related to equality, my brief was specifically related to racial discrimination as I was sect 11 funded. It was interesting seeing how bias, often completely unconscious affected much of the process of many senior managers and potentially left them open to claims of discrimination.
I had an English surname then! It was just that I came from a different part of England.
I think many of us wouldn't class ourselves as racist but like myself feel that this mass illegal immigration isn't being tackled correctly, nobody seems to be telling the general public why these people are leaving the countries of their Birth to travel thousands of miles to come to the UK & Europe.
They say persecution , what does that mean in every day terms, how is their passage funded ?
These people are being led into slavery by the promise of a better life!! But that isn't always the case when they come over illegally. The gangs definitely need to be tackled in France to stop The spread of misinformation.
It's the drip drip of miss- information giving out my the likes of Farage & TR, on the news and on social media that feeds the those mental health issues if you already anxious and are unable to pick up that what they are telling you, isn't the real world of perhaps it is.!! Only time will tell .
The education and help needs to start in the countries they are leaving not the countries they are coming too.
Whitewavemark2
Talking about football hooliganism - apparently the atmosphere amongst much of the crowd was just like the football crowds of the 80s - white mainly working class males - many drunk - attacking the police .
The police were there to keep supporter of the opposing team apart so why are you blaming the police!?
Allira Recruitment and selection has always been an area where people could exercise their prejudice. Your man at the council was prejudiced against "furriners", probably someone with a foreign name would not have even made the cut to be interviewed. As I've said on previous threads, I used to train senior management in ensuring their recruitment and selection procedures did not contravine existing laws related to equality, my brief was specifically related to racial discrimination as I was sect 11 funded. It was interesting seeing how bias, often completely unconscious affected much of the process of many senior managers and potentially left them open to claims of discrimination.
Talking about football hooliganism - apparently the atmosphere amongst much of the crowd was just like the football crowds of the 80s - white mainly working class males - many drunk - attacking the police .
Racism goes much further than mere suspicion of one’s neighbours.
It is an entirely different phenomenon
MaizieD
When we moved to the NE in the 1980s we were told that in the not too distant past the 'lads' from two neighbouring mining communities about 3 miles apart would regularly meet halfway on a Saturday night for a good punch up.
Having said that, the thing that I loved about the NE is that the people mostly welcomed and accepted us 'southerners'.
Not like Yorkshire, where I'd lived for 14 years previously and it was always made clear that there was a barrier between proper Yorkshire folk and incomers.
There used to be punch-ups every Saturday night here too a few years ago.
Three different 'tribes' apparently!
Thank goodness no longer 🤞
Wyllow3
But David, it's important to understand the psychological elements in racism, the "drivers" in order to make changes in ourselves and in how we approach others.
Lack of self awareness in why we act as we do leads to clumsy and generalising assumptions, which is what I "See" in your post.
We are all suspicions of the intentions of others even neighbours of the same tribe. New people move in next door, what are they going to be like, are they going to be noisy are they going to build an extension. Until you get to know them (if you ever do) you are cautious, it’s what everyone does.
If there is a physiological reason it’s fear of the unknown, the other reason for racism or discrimination is gaining or keeping power. Not too much physiology just greed.
petra
David49
And there was me thinking I was the only one ( here, not in the real world) who understands that.
Many years ago you could go to quiet Essex villages where they distrusted others
My late friend was a barge skipper in Maldon. He worked and lived on the quay. He didn’t like the people who live up the town as he called it.
Before we became friends he considered me an alien being a woman from southeast london 😂
I was a furriner who shouldn't be stealing a job from locals, apparently. He said he'd thrown my application in the bin when I enquired about progress because I was moving to that area shortly.
That was the man in charge of Human Resources at a City Council many years ago!
fancythat
Whitewavemark2
cariadAgain
Nothing wrong with the odd bomb - it gets people thinking and discussing.
However, I did not endorse the OP and if you look a few posts down from the original post you will see how I suggest one way that “othering” and racism might develop.
But as maizie also pointed out, no one ever picks that baton up and runs with it.I never think any opening post is written without some endorsement.
And the title doesnt help either.
Well I suppose I endorsed it in as much as I thought it would make a good talking point.
As I suggested that it fails to show (although it is not within the subjects remit) why people are feeling the way they are.
I had hoped that posters would look more at the reasons for the behaviour we are witnessing around the country.
I have posted what I think is causing it.
But no one picked that up.
But as maizie said
No one is really interested in the causes of the malaise.
Lathyrus3
TerriBull
Oh well the Celts then! but how far back should we go, even the Celts emigrated here from various places, The Danube basin I read, but other places too. I said Anglo Saxon because that's often how we are described as a collective ethnicity, but clearly we all have other strands given the trail of settlers from numerous places.
Your other point was not something I knew about but will take your point on thatJust shows how far back we can identify with “our tribe” and resent incomers😬
I think Neanderthals were here first.
Most humans today have some Neanderthal DNA.
Whitewavemark2
cariadAgain
Nothing wrong with the odd bomb - it gets people thinking and discussing.
However, I did not endorse the OP and if you look a few posts down from the original post you will see how I suggest one way that “othering” and racism might develop.
But as maizie also pointed out, no one ever picks that baton up and runs with it.
I never think any opening post is written without some endorsement.
And the title doesnt help either.
When we moved to the NE in the 1980s we were told that in the not too distant past the 'lads' from two neighbouring mining communities about 3 miles apart would regularly meet halfway on a Saturday night for a good punch up.
Having said that, the thing that I loved about the NE is that the people mostly welcomed and accepted us 'southerners'.
Not like Yorkshire, where I'd lived for 14 years previously and it was always made clear that there was a barrier between proper Yorkshire folk and incomers.
That’s definitely true -Eastwinders, my dad calls incomes.
Haha petra
Even in just England you can live somewhere for 30 years and still be an incomer😁
David49
And there was me thinking I was the only one ( here, not in the real world) who understands that.
Many years ago you could go to quiet Essex villages where they distrusted others
My late friend was a barge skipper in Maldon. He worked and lived on the quay. He didn’t like the people who live up the town as he called it.
Before we became friends he considered me an alien being a woman from southeast london 😂
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