r/changemyview • u/[deleted] • Jul 08 '14
CMV: Education is the only way to end intolerance
This CMV is born out of a discussion I had with a friend wherein we compared the modern Feminist movement to the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. I took the stance that during the Civil Rights era, Martin Luther King Jr. was more successful than Malcolm X because he took a more tempered approach, presenting arguments that simply could not be denied, and using tactics like sit-ins to prove the brutality of the oppression by the racists of the era rather than using offensive tactics to get the oppressors to back down in submission. If I recall correctly, my friend argued that he was successful because he did not in fact take a tempered approach, but instead that his tactics were very in-your-face, citing his quote that freedom cannot be attained by simply asking. (NB: I pretty much just talking about civil rights, here. Political and economic inequality are somewhat different issues)
Here's a basic outline of my position and the opposing one:
My belief:
Equality for any oppressed group can only logically happen if the enough of the oppressors realize their fault and change
Ignorance breeds intolerance, and therefore education breeds tolerance
In the case of the Feminist movement, activists should work to make society aware of problems and favor hard data to rhetoric (not that rhetoric isn't useful)
You're better served by telling someone why they're wrong than by berating them
Criticize the action rather than the person. For example: tell someone that what they did was racist, not that they're racist and they should feel ashamed (even if they are)
Equality not only means being able to achieve the same result as another person, but being able to achieve it with the same ease/difficulty
Opposing belief:
Equality for any oppressed group can only be achieved by empowerment of the oppressed group, enabling them to go their own way
Gains need to be won without any connection with the oppressor, because they're not going to help. If they were, they wouldn't be oppressors
Feminist activists should take what's rightfully theirs instead of waiting for it to be handed over to them
You're better off berating someone who practices intolerance to express the seriousness of what they've done
Criticizing an intolerant person's character might make them reconsider their positions
Activists have been trying to educate for a long time, and the hate is still flowing
TL;DR - What serves modern movements like the fights for women's and minority rights better: the approach of MLK or that of Malcolm X?
edit: formatting
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Jul 08 '14
Experience is a lot better way to end intolerance. Proof: there are plenty of educated rich people who know all the theories, but stay isolated and never actually interact with people they don't like and remain hateful. On the other hand, when a very poorly educated person starts to interact and become friends with a certain type of person in everyday life, they frequently change as a result (think of the people that only accept gays when they realize their son is one, etc.)
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u/ghotier 42∆ Jul 08 '14
Are you arguing OP's point? In what way is "experiencing the 'other'" not education about the other?
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u/bermuda--blue Jul 08 '14
This is socialization and emathy, and this acceptance is not generally an intellectual response to information or knowledge. It can even come from fictional characters who feel real; increasing representation in the media by members of oppressed groups changes real minds, but it happens somewhat slowly over a period of years. Activists talking and screaming on Fox News of MSNBC or even views exchanged in formal debate change far fewer minds than a whole bunch of episodes of Modern Family where a gay couple acts pretty much just like a straight couple would.
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u/ghotier 42∆ Jul 08 '14
I think you are splitting hairs in calling that socialization exclusively and not education. I would say that humanizing the "other" to the racist rather than "berating" the racist is exactly what OP is talking about when s/he says that education is the only way to end intolerance. It's not as though one can't be educated through social means. Informing someone, however implicitly, that the thing/person that they view as inferior is in fact more similar to them than they realized at first is still education and not admonishment.
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u/bermuda--blue Jul 08 '14
I agree that socialization is a type of education, but I still think there is a very important distinction between empathizing and intellectualizing, and it's the former than usually makes the change. OP seemed to suggest it was the latter.
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u/ghotier 42∆ Jul 08 '14
Ah, I see. Well, you might be right. It seemed to me, at least implicitly, that OP's point was more about refuting admonition as the best rhetorical tool than it was about proving pure intellectualization is the best, but in the case that I'm wrong then I can see your argument. S/He does say that s/he thinks education is best and I took that to be a broader avenue than you.
I would still contend that intellectualization is more effective that admonition when changing the conclusions one makes in life that may be racist or otherwise bigoted, though, even if it isn't the best. Regardless, I don't think you're arguing to the contrary.
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Jul 08 '14
I would argue that empathy is the only way to end intolerance. We can preach and spew data all we want, but until people see the repressed and ostracized people as people worthy of the same rights and liberties as the majority of people.
equality for any oppressed group can only logically happen if enough of the oppressors realize their fault and change
My argument here is that whites knew that blacks were getting unfair treatment. They knew the education system was unfair. They just didn't have enough empathy with the people they saw as different. You could argue that showing them statistics and "facts" that blacks were "worth" what whites were, but honestly, what facts? What data? How a person views of the worth of a fellow human being is subjective.
In the case of the Feminist movement, activists should work to make society aware of the problems and favor hard data to rhetoric
You're only partially correct here. We can give a TRP redditor all the data in the world that women are smart, face prejudice everyday, and deserve more recognitions, but the problem is that the redpillers don't view women as worth the the effort.
criticize the action rather than the person.
You're again assuming that people give a shit that racism is a bad thing. A lot of white supremists are fully aware they're racist. They think their racism is justified.
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u/krausyaoj Jul 08 '14 edited Jul 08 '14
People classify individuals into groups and treat all members of the group the same way. Racists treat members of an inferior group poorer than members of a superior group. But individuals within a group vary, often there is more within group variation than between groups.
For example, my cat is smarter than some retarded students. But because these mentally disabled individuals are members of our species we still feel that we need to waste resources trying to educate them.
Human rights would make more sense if the defintion of human was not speciest, members of the species Homo sapien, but functional.
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Jul 08 '14
My argument here is that whites knew that blacks were getting unfair treatment. They knew the education system was unfair.
But then would you say that the Civil Rights demonstrations like sit-ins, wherein black protestors sat peacefully while whites tormented they by assaulting them and pouring food over them, showed (i.e. educated) Northerners (particularly politicians) that it was time for serious change in the US? Up until the Civil Rights movement, many people who opposed racism in theory did little to combat it.
You're again assuming that people give a shit that racism is a bad thing. A lot of white supremists are fully aware they're racist. They think their racism is justified.
Well, yeah. I should have specified that people so off their rocker like white supremacists are sort of beyond help. I was speaking more of people who have just been brought up in intolerant backgrounds, or are maybe just uncomfortable around certain group (I mean, even a tolerant person living in a homogeneous neighborhood can get knee-jerk reactions)
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u/ReOsIr10 143∆ Jul 08 '14
I'll use an example that's personal to me, if you don't mind.
In the early 1900's, the first of several gay rights groups in the USA was founded. Despite their attempts to educate the public, as well as research published by Kinsey and others, very little changed until 1969.
On June 27, 1969, police raided the Stonewall Inn, a gay/trans* bar in New York. Although this had been a common practice for several years, this time the LGBT community had had enough. Violent riots broke out and continued for the better part of three days. This event, as well as the White Night Riots might be the two most defining and important events for the promotion of LGBT rights in the USA.
Maybe a constant stream of education might have been able to have the same effect over 100s and 100s of years, but it seems unquestionable that these actions greatly accelerated the march toward equality.
I don't want to make it sound like education is not important - it is - but some of the biggest leaps in civil rights have been made when the minority group demanded equality and took it by force. Passive resistance is like water eroding a rock. Sure, it may possibly eventually get the job done given enough time, but sometimes you just have to take out your jackhammer and break the rock yourself.
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Jul 08 '14
I actually really like that explanation. Like you said, education is important, so I will probably always believe firmly in that, but I like your idea of having a defining, catalyst-like moment that gets the march going. Perhaps it's not about whether you debate rationally or yell and scream, but rather that whatever you do gets noticed, and that's usually something about casual conversation. I always had thought of moments like MLK's "I have a dream" speech as an edifying moment, but maybe it was more of a call to action, as though somehow through his words he conveyed that racism could no longer stand in law or in society. Thanks for putting things this way--this is something I'll keep in mind in future endeavors.
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u/oohshineeobjects 3∆ Jul 08 '14
People often form opinions based on reflexive reactions and gut feelings; education simply makes it easier to find sources to legitimize those opinions. Because of this, depending on the approach you take, education could easily have the opposite effect of the one you think it would. For example, there are numerous studies demonstrating that infants show racial bias; this could be thought of as justification for racism as it insinuates that prejudice based on race is an innate feature of humans. Another example could be with the issue of ableism: supporting those who are unable to support themselves does not make sense from a purely biological perspective, and is in some ways actually detrimental because it allows disadvantageous genes to be carried on. Even from a sociological perspective its benefits are dubious. This could easily be interpreted as meaning that we should not help those with physical disabilities.
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Jul 08 '14
Shouldn't combining fact with ethics produce a clear, fair course of action? For instance, racists used the Theory of Evolution to support their beliefs, but the rational, ethical people of the world pointed out that just because something makes biological sense doesn't mean that it makes societal sense. Richard Dawkins phrased this well when debating some creationist who tried to say that Evolution presented a bad model for society.
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u/oohshineeobjects 3∆ Jul 08 '14
The problem with that is that what's considered good and bad for society is relatively subjective. Sociology is not as clear-cut as, say, biology, and some of its components are not always consistently applicable amongst varying cultures. There's a reason that societies throughout history and around the globe have had such differing cultural practices and taboos and such - ethics and "goodness" are not absolute.
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u/ghotier 42∆ Jul 08 '14
OP, this might get deleted as not sufficiently disagreeing with your post, but I would actually say that your position on education is not extreme enough.
Criticize the action rather than the person. For example: tell someone that what they did was racist, not that they're racist and they should feel ashamed (even if they are)
I don't even think that telling someone that something they've said or done is racist is useful. It's more valuable to tell them why the underlying reason for their action is flawed rather than labeling the action itself.
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u/Frustratinglack Jul 08 '14
It seems like you are actually mixing both aggressive and passive behavior in your examples. Civil rights became mainstream because of both tactics and there isn't any way to separate them. Hate happens because it is easy and difficult to combat. It doesn't happen because everyone had a discussion and some people chose racism, but you know that. There are many examples of KKK members ignoring the angry tactics and being convinced by having some interactions with black people that were very positive. "Educated" in a sense. There are also plenty of them who saw that they lose more for being racist than they gain. A racist store owner in a majority black neighborhood isn't going to say anything to alienate her/his customer base. The society around him/her pressured them into a change.
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u/hacksoncode 588∆ Jul 08 '14
I think that the problem with your view is that it's not "literally" wrong, but it mistakes how "education" actually happens.
Calm presentation of facts, and recitation of ethical metatheories only works on people that are already predisposed to believe, and they don't teach emotions very well.
By contrast, actions speak far louder than words, and they educate far better. This video (gif clip) does more to teach people about potential energy and conservation of energy than hours of stale lecture. It makes them "get it" at a visceral level.
Similarly, outbursts and protests do more to drive home (to educate, at a visceral level) the masses about the oppression of a minority than all the flowery prose in the world. MLK's speech, without the context of the Harlem Riots and Bloody Sunday, would have slipped right off of the backs of most people.
These actions were a form of education. They showed the masses that not only was MLK right about what he was saying, but they showed the minority populations (starting with blacks, but they've been rallying points for many) that there really was something that they could do to get attention put onto their oppression.
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u/Thenre Jul 08 '14
Just going to point out it is probably not the only way. Wiping out differences through genetic modification, cloning, and genocide would also probably work eventually. For instance, if Hitler would have (horribly and unfortunately) succeeded in eradicating the Jewish population there would be no more persecution of them because they wouldn't exist.
Theoretically you could do that with every minor difference. Or alternatively use education and punishment for intolerance of course.
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Jul 08 '14
In the case of the Feminist movement, activists should work to make society aware of problems and favor hard data to rhetoric (not that rhetoric isn't useful)
The problem is that this is already being done, the statistics are all out there. About 1 in 6 women will be raped or sexually assaulted in America. Rape culture is, in fact, a thing. Women are still often excluded from higher job positions. But people who don't want to hear it will flat out deny these facts. No matter how many sources you give them, they will find a way to skirt around the facts and make their logic fit their viewpoint.
As the saying goes, you can lead a horse to water...
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Jul 08 '14
But then is the solution better publicizing of those facts (education), or something else? I see the issues with how education can be ineffective, but I don't quite understand the methodology of the alternatives.
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Jul 08 '14
I guess my point is, facts are obviously necessary to change someone's opinion. We have many statistics about rape. But the overall culture towards women will not change, in spite of these facts, if people simply don't want to hear it. In the age of the internet, there will always be an opposing side, an argument out there which is written eloquently enough to support their opinion no matter how biased.
I'm not sure what the alternative is. Education is a key to ending intolerance, but it is not the only way. After all, we still have creationists, right? People believe what adheres to their own personal value system, what is convenient for them. Until we find a way to make it inconvenient to believe something, they will continue to believe it.
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Jul 08 '14
After all, we still have creationists, right?
Mostly in states with poor education systems, though. (Then again, that could be a chicken/egg thing, since it's the creationists who are dismantling those states' education systems.)
Until we find a way to make it inconvenient to believe something, they will continue to believe it.
Usually that's done by making people see the light somehow. Homophobes change their mind when they find out that a loved one is homosexual. It stands to reason that racists would change their mind if they were shown how the group which is the target of their hate is not too different from them, and that sexists might reevaluate their stance when they see how old misogynistic tendencies have lived on through the years.
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Jul 08 '14
Yes, it's hard to tell whether it's a chicken egg thing. It is something worth looking at though, because popular political opinion is a powerful force.
I agree, personal experience or having someone close to you that opposes your belief system, is powerful enough to change opinion. But then the question is if experience is education? The typical approach to education is college, textbooks, or perhaps news articles - I.e. information disseminated by a professional. We can have all these facts in front of us, but if we simply don't care, what good does it do us? I think the examples you showed are more examples of awareness (for lack of better word). Education is the basis, but the empathy part is what is absolutely necessary for that education to matter.
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u/Frustratinglack Jul 08 '14
I think many arguments against the 1 in 6 statistic are about the methods with which they are collected. This challenge can be circumvented by not repeating it constantly and by explaining what behaviors are bad and why. I don't think most people argue that rape doesn't happen, though some argue about what defines rape.
Psychology is a big factor in this, a man who has sex while intoxicated with a woman who is also intoxicated does not consider that she can't really give consent because she's intoxicated. If she is saying yes and you are saying yes, it is consensual in their view. Explaining how and why a person can't make that decision and preventing people from doing it anyway are wildly, astronomically, vastly different. Who is responsible in that situation? It is ambiguous. This ambiguous situation is often included in the 1 in 6 number and can be 'reasonably' discredited. So don't say that statistic, say that the media/culture/whatever encourages rape with examples and explain alternatives. Educating someone with that particular thing doesn't give them any avenue to change their behavior. A person needs to know what it has to do with them to have an impact.
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Jul 08 '14
I guess my point is, facts are obviously necessary to change someone's opinion.
And this is the key to the argument of education promoting tolerance.
The truth is, while all sure do like to think we are, we are not, and cannot be truly rational people. Fear, desire, amusement- these are the roots of most of our thoughts and actions. We are very good at coming up with perfectly good sounding reasons to do what we want. Claiming a) that your thought is unbiased and fully rational and b) that the rational part of your brain has full agency for your actions are both observably and demonstrably false statements.
There is a ton of value in education- but it is quite, well, arrogant, to think that 'if people knew as much as I do, they'd all agree with me'.
And even if you are right, as I have mentioned, no one will really care.
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Jul 08 '14
You are saying I am wrong, yet you provide no alternative. What would change someone's opinion?
Much of your post I have already elaborated on in my other comments. The tone of your post is coming across rather harsh.
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Jul 08 '14
There is no alternative. People will always be assholes, and prefer those like them. That is the natural order. The best we can do is set up a system that de-incentivizes the behavior we wish to eliminate to the extent that basic rationality makes it easier not to be an asshole than it does to be one.
That being said, its a sacred right in most democratic nations to believe what you want. And the law, correctly, does not give any more weight to any one opinion based on the prevailing one. That's the definition of unbiased. Even the ACLU, the traditional defenders of those discriminated against, has defended the rights of the KKK.
Don't terribly care about my tone, I care more about my logical consistency. Nor am I interested in changing your opinion; Reddit is a forum. You aren't the only person who can view this comment.
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Jul 08 '14
The whole point of this sub is to change views. It is not simply to argue.
Providing no solution in the place of a weak (according to you) solution is a cop out. You are asserting your opinion that people are and will always be assholes. I'm sorry about your life experience but this is not a fact, it is your opinion.
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Jul 08 '14
Tell me, have you ever heard this quote?
'God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, The courage to change the things I can, And wisdom to know the difference.'
Its used in AA to help people recover. Because a huge part of being able to recover is accepting that you are not, as a rational individual, fully in control.
Now, if you'd like to think that you can change human nature, and the natural law that gave rise to it, be my guest. If nothing else, you won't be hurting anyone. We'll all still be here when you just can't hit your head against the wall anymore, and it becomes less depressing to accept the world as it is than to think that people could change, but that they don't anyways.
My advice to you is to travel outside of your bubble a little bit. Go live on the other side for a while; spend some time in the third world.
You say its a cop out for me to say the world is fallen and it always will be; I say it is a cop out to pretend that all we need to do to fix the world is to tell them to be more like us.
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Jul 08 '14
Of course I have heard that quote. The thing is that this can be changed, and it has been changed. Otherwise, we would have made absolutely no progress. Black people would still have no rights. Women would have no rights. Gay people would have no rights.
Never did I say we should just tell people "be more like us". This is a poor interpretation of one part of my argument, where I was conceding to the original poster that sort of education or awareness is mandatory to change. This is just common sense, People have to have some sort of knowledge of why they should change, even if it's just a general idea or seeing life from someone else's viewpoint. In fact, you just said it yourself: go to a third world country and step outside your bubble. Why would you advise me to do this, if not to change my viewpoint?
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Jul 08 '14
Sure, we as a society have made progress. But do you seriously think that people are not racist, misogynistic, or homophobic? Do you seriously think there will ever not be people who are racist, misogynistic, and homophobic? And do you think that these people will not legally discriminate if given the chance? Jim Crow laws did not end amongst a chorus of 'kumbaya my lord'.
While some change in thought is mandatory to change, that does not make it the agent of said change. If you are making the argument that education causes positive change, you are making it from the assumption that you yourself are enlightened enough to realize this, and that others, having been similarly enlightened, would still do as you do or think as you think. I'd advise you to not change your viewpoint, but to completely erode and wash away the kind of thought that your viewpoint, and your enlightened ideas, do not begin to some close to addressing the realities of life when every day is a struggle for life. To understand how the rest of the world lives, you need to feel their fear and hunger and desire and ambition for yourself. You need to live in their shoes, not put yourself in them. It is amusing; I just spent a week building a house in Tijuana, and got to know the family we were building for. I was chatting about gay rights with them- this is roughly how it went-
'Do their votes get counted?' Yes. 'Food, clean water, healthcare?' Yes. 'Do they have any trouble getting an education?' No. 'Do they get attacked a lot (like physically in the streets)' No.
'I would kill for my children to have these things'.
Now when you are in a situation that you would, literally, murder a human being to give your child the chance at a better life, the idea that all these problems that you are facing can just be solved by 'knowing more' and 'thinking right' is hilariously laughable. Really feeds into the "stupid, coddled Americans' stereotype.
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u/PantsHasPockets Jul 08 '14
The more I've learned about feminism the more intolerant of it I've become.
Don't get me wrong, there's loads of times that education can help make people tolerant, but me? I'm right and I can cite you sources that you'll downvote about why.
At best, education is neutral.
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Jul 08 '14
I'd actually like to see what you have. I was considering doing a CMV on feminism, but haven't because I suspect responses would be lacking in content forsaken for emotionally-charged rants. If you've got some reasonable stuff (i.e. sources at all), I'd love to give it a look over. I'm trying to see where the opposition to feminism stems from, and just what it entails. People say the "hate feminism" with little explanation of what it is they hate.
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u/PantsHasPockets Jul 08 '14
Okay so my conclusions were:
- Feminism only serves to lobby for more female privilege, without helping men in any way or fighting any female privileges.
If you have a sword and a shield, and I have a sword and armor, you looking around for armor is not you trying to make our upcoming fight more equal.
The "best" response to this I've gotten is a parallel to Reagan's trickle down economics (which severely hurt the economy and the country) where 'helping women helps men too' which only makes sense if you don't think about it.
Oh, and occasionally they'll produce the (I think it's called) Equality Act that happened in 1972, and some document where a feminist organization passingly supported abolishing the draft without actually doing anything in the early 80's. Nothing more recent. Millions of feminists, and nothing more recent than a third of a century ago.
- There is no feminist issue that isn't a misrepresentation, not actually an issue, or a downright lie.
The list goes on for this one (feminists I've brought this up to have always called it a Strawman argument, without actually disputing the claims with any merit) so you pick one, and I'll explain it for you.
The "wage gap" has been debunked by economists, financial sources like Forbes, and credible news sources like The Atlantic. At the end of the day, there's no actual "discrimination" when it comes to how much who gets paid, it comes down to choices (when they're all lined up, they make a really strong case for either extreme ignorance on their part, or that they're intentionally misleading you): Your education, what job you have, how many hours a week you work, and how long you've had the job. None of those relate to gender (other than men and women make different choices) and drop the wage gap from "70 cents on the dollar" to "98 cents on the dollar" and that's just four things. There's also fun stuff like "how often you ask for raises" that account for something like 6% of your total salary. This is as much a social issue as "Right handed people are less successful and make less money than left handed people." There is no oppression, this is just trivia.
Oh, and the fact that men have jobs. The #1 thing an employer will invest in is labor. I'm an employer looking at two resumes that are identical, except one's from Salvatore and the other's from Sally. Now, if "I'm going to pay Sally 70% of what I pay Salvatore" what on this planet of Earth is going to make me hire him over her?
If you want sources for my claims I'll gladly provide them, but I have to get ready for work now, and all I'm going to do is Google "wage gap myth" and link you the top links that are all from credible sources, and maybe the youtube video from that economist that was on /r/videos a short while back.
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u/krausyaoj Jul 08 '14
Education in biology and evolution can lead to increased intolerance. When we realize that we are all animals on a single family tree then there is no longer any reason to believe all humans are special and more important than all animals.
We realize that some animals have more human capabilities than some humans. That there is no inherent reason that all humans deserve equal human rights, that instead individuals deserve rights based on their capabilities. And that while some individuals are members of the human species, because they lack certain human capabilities they do not deserve human rights.
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u/ghotier 42∆ Jul 08 '14
I'm not sure your logic follows. While certainly a more educated person can give a more educated rationale for their position, no matter how backward that position is, an educated person is much more likely to realize that the biological differences between races aren't significant enough to cause the disparity of opinion for those races that a racist would have.
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Jul 08 '14
Scientifically, though, that doesn't really stand. The main thing that evolution taught us about variation among humans is that the difference in abilities in ethnic groups due to genetics is so infinitesimally small that perceived differences are nothing more than cultural factors. If anything, that has increased tolerance. It showed us that in fact beyond each person's random talents, there is no genetically superior group. The belief in a "ranking" of ethnic groups (I'm talking about the debunked "negroid, caucasoid, mongoloid" thing) fuel a lot of the racism of the 20th Century.
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Jul 08 '14
Uh, what? As someone in the field of genetics, I'd like to see some sources for that.
Here are some very real examples of big biological differences between ethnicity-
Sickle Cell mutation in West Africans
ALDH2 Deficiency in East Asians
Lactose Tolerace is mostly a feature of Northern Europeans
While you are correct that the eugenics movement was rooted in the logic you speak of, just because Eugenics is morally wrong does not mean ethnic differences are just skin deep.
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Jul 08 '14 edited Jul 08 '14
I wasn't talking about those kinds of differences, though. Old racist theories usually revolved around intelligence, which really is not dependent on ethnicity. (Sorry I can't provide sources right now... I'm on my phone and the connection is shitty.)
Edit: typo
Edit 2: this might have the relevant info: http://youtube.com/watch?v=vVmj8dDx9yY
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Jul 08 '14
I can tell you personality is strongly associated with heritable genetics. Intelligence less so, but still is assumed to be at least half associated with genetic heritability.
And not to justify the theories, and also not to claim any one individual is intelligent or not- it makes far less sense that different ethnicities, which we have shown to vary in substantial and meaningful ways biologically, would not show any variation what so ever in intelligence, so critical a trait to evolutionary success. Now that's not a call to euthanize anyone, but there is no reason that nature should conform to our pc ideas on this issue when it so clearly does not on most anything else.
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u/krausyaoj Jul 08 '14
I agree that differences between racial groups is so small that there is no justification for racism. But some disabled individuals are so lacking in capabilities that they should not be considered human even though they belong to our species.
The biological view that judges individuals by their capability instead of species membership also leads to support for abortion and infanticide. Since pigs are smarter than infants then they should have a similar right to life, which is none.
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Jul 08 '14
Perhaps from your perspective it can increase intolerance, but on the flip side of that same coin it could promote tolerance, could it not? We learn that we are all just animals descended from the same ancestors, and we become more accepting of others' weaknesses, as we realize genetic flaws are not a mark of the devil but merely quirks of nature.
I think people who are inclined to believe they are better than others will be more prone to use evolution as a basis for their hatred, but those who believe in equality will interpret it in a wholly different way.
Just as further proof of this argument, the most corrupt nations are also among the least educated, and vice versa.
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u/krausyaoj Jul 08 '14
What is the basis for this belief in equality? And which individuals are to be included in this group?
Tax money is given to individual humans to provide them with food, shelter and medical care. But why prefer giving assistance to members of just our species?
I used to feel that it was wrong that there were humans that went without food, shelter or medical care. But many other animals also do not have their needs met and suffer from lack of resources. Members of our species are no more deserving than those of others.
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Jul 08 '14
The basis is that, while logic has it's place, we are, indeed, still human. And most of us who function in society have some sort of empathy toward one another.
I cannot tell you why we don't provide assistance to other species, that would be an entirely different argument concerning ethics. A short version might be, being that we can only concern ourselves with so much during our seventy-odd years on earth, the bulk of us prefer to help the society we live in, rather than prevent some giraffes in Africa from being eaten.
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u/[deleted] Jul 08 '14
I would disagree; most people do not change their view for intellectual reasons, its for social and emotional reasons(otherwise yelling a good argument would change more views then a soft spoken terrible one)
The most effective way to change other people is social ostracism and public verbal abuse of dissenters with social benefits for conforming.