Hey Crni- I am not sure. For example, I dig hot chicks. My prejudice is hottiness. If she's hot, I am interested.
I am not saying that prejudice is either good or bad. Just that we as humans will have to deal with it probably for ever, because it is a part of our behaviour. Like no clue, fear or anger which are neither good or bad, but simply emotions. What you do with your emotions is the question. I am pretty sure that some 30 000 years ago, a healthy doze of prejudice has saved the one or other cavemans live, but beeng prejudiced all the time, isn't really helpfull either, because at some point you had to get out there and finde a potential mate.
Prejudice isn't natural. Rather, its a consequence of fear and fear is a reflection of a lack of confidence and courage. Curiousity is as primal as fear. If it weren't we'd still be living in the fucking caves.
I think it isl natural, up to a certain extend. What ever if you let prejudices dictate your behaviour or not is a different question. I have prejudices, and I am pretty sure you have them as well. But I don't let mine dictate how I treat people I don't know. But you still have to somehow 'judge' people that you see for the first time in your life, and when you do that, it's already prejudice. Doesn't mean it has to be negative or positive.
Seriously, we humans usually don't need more than a couple of seconds before we decide if we find someone sexy, likedable or what ever. We are very very primeval beeings under the surface, we tend to forget that quite often. But really, it doesn't take that much to push people over the edge.
Sometimes I think ,it's really a miracle that most of us manage to function at all without screaming all the damn time, when you consider how many strong feelings are constantly in conflict with each other. I never noticed that really, before I didn't start to work with children, and they are really amazing creatures I tell you! Most of the ones I supevice are between 11 and 12, and they are some little bags full of all sorts of emotions. Sadly many of our children here, have some serious issues as well, abusive parents, neglence, viollence, parents really don't know what damage they do to their children.
Let me lay an idea on you that I got from David Ignatiev in his dicussion about the violence and intolerance found in the Balkans back in the 1990s. "Intolerance is a form of divided consciousness in which abstract, conceptual, ideological hatred vanquishes concrete, real, and individual moments of identification…. To the degree that individuals can ever learn to think for themselves- and so become true individuals- they can free themselves, one by one, from the deadly dynamic of the narcissism of minor differences. In that sense, the function of liberal society is not merely to teach the noble fiction of human universality, but to create individuals, sufficiently robust in their own identity, to live by that fiction."
Yeah, all nice and dandy. But would you put your own life on it? I mean given a real situation. Where a christian orthodox serbian group with kalashnikovs is walking toward your bosnian village full of muslims and you have no clue what they want, will you wait till they greet you? Or will you attack them? Or will you flee?
I agree with a lot of what you say, and god knows I am one of the most tolerant people you will ever meet. But sadly, even I who is preaching love for everyone and everything, has to agree ... reality can be a real bitch sometimes and it will kick us all in the nuts, regardless what ideology we have. And being prejudiced can actually save your live in some cases ... as much as I hate to say it.