Prejudice is Inevitable

Running head: PREJUDICE IS INEVITABLE
PREJUDICE IS INEVITABLE
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1PREJUDICE IS INEVITABLE
Prejudice is deeply rooted in the history of humankind of every human society. For years
people are struggling to combat prejudice of various kinds through various ways for it can have a
severe impact on groups who are the victim of prejudice (Jahoda, 2018). Even though there have
been revolutions in order to eliminate prejudice from society, it seems a never-ending process
when one prejudice ends another is noticed. The question that arises is if there will ever be a
society without prejudice behavior. Why is it difficult to eliminate prejudice from society? Is
prejudice inevitable? In a similar discourse, the essay aims to discuss if that prejudice is
inevitable along with the support of social psychological theories. The essay will discuss the
concept of prejudice and the way it is inculcated in human nature which makes it inevitable in
society.
According to Whitley and Kite (2016), prejudice can be defined as an unjustified or
incorrect attitude towards an individual that emerge due to the individual’s membership of a
social group. Prejudice certainly have the ability to impact on the way people behave, treat or
interact with other people, specifically with the people who are different than them. Prejudice is
commonly the negative behavior of a person towards the other person solely for identity.
Prejudice is interlinked with other aspects of society. It is baseless yet very profoundly found in
society. Some of the typical features of prejudice are stereotyped beliefs, negative feelings and a
tendency to discriminate against members of the group. The process of prejudice involves
stereotyping and discrimination (Fishbein, 2014). The process of stereotyping includes
perception and categorization. The most common view about prejudice is the fact that it holds a
predetermined perspective, prejudgments that are often negative or abusive in regards to a group
for its identity. It is usually when the people hold any prejudicial attitudes towards others, they
have the tendency to view all the people who fits into a specific group as being the same. They

2PREJUDICE IS INEVITABLE
consider every individual of that particular group holding the same characteristics. Various forms
of prejudice include racism, sexism, homophobia, classism, nationalism, ageism, religious
prejudice and xenophobia (Hamilton, 2015).
Developed from the theories of Sigmund Freud, the psychodynamic approach has been
formed. According to the psychodynamic theory, human feelings and behavior are powerfully
affected by unconscious motives. These unconscious motives certainly have some root sources
which shapes the attitudes and behavior (Basham et al., 2016). The unconscious mind comprises
mental process are not accessible to consciousness, but they are influential on judgments,
emotions and feelings. According to Freud, the primary source of human behavior is the
unconscious mind and it is the part that cannot be seen. Human feelings, motives and decisions
are genuinely powerful which effects through past experiences that are stored in the unconscious
mind. Perceiving from the psychodynamic perspective, there is an internal conflict stemming
from the practice of child-rearing that induces hostility and anger (Dicks, 2014). Many parents
willingly or unwillingly treat their children with frustration and oppose their attempts to become
independent. They take out an excessive amount of anger and frustration. The children in return
are overwhelmed by feelings of guilt and anxiety for the fact that aggression is inappropriate
which make them suffer hostility towards their parents. Since they cannot manifest this hostility
against their own parents, they direct their hostility to a minority group. The parents of the
children are as they have identified them as parents and interjected some characteristics of the
anxiety object they fail to take out the developing anger and aggression on the groups that are
considered weak in that specific society. They change themselves from being threatened to
aggressors which help them overcome the fear of punishment they undergo for their parents.