November 26--Reflecting on Contact Bias

The more we bump into the folks who are so-called “other,” the more we are stretched and the more we are pulled out of bias. We have new truths, because we have tangible evidence of the beautiful, powerful creativity of our God who made all of this diversity for us to enjoy.  --Jacqui Lewis
(See posts Nov 18 & 22 on biases.)

    These are the words of Brian McLaren regarding contact bias:

When I don’t have intense and sustained personal contact with “the other,” my prejudices and false assumptions go unchallenged. Think of the child who is told by people he trusts that people of another race, religion, culture, sexual orientation, or class are dirty and dangerous.

You can immediately see the self-reinforcing cycle: those people are dirty or dangerous, so I will distrust and avoid them, which means I will never have sustained and respectful interactive contact with them, which means I will never discover that they are actually wonderful people to be around.

In this way, the prejudice cycle spins on, unchallenged across generations. As prejudice persists, it becomes embedded in cultures and institutions, creating systems of racism and hatred, marginalizing groups who are stigmatized, dehumanized, scapegoated, exploited, oppressed, or even killed.

    I grew up in a predominantly WASP area in the boonies of Pennsylvania. For reasons unknown to me, my dad despised Catholics. Yet my best friend from 7th grade on was Catholic, so they didn't seem so awful to me. My cousin did the unthinkable and ran off and married an African American man. Most of the African Americans in our area in PA lived in one particular small town, I kid you not. We had a few African American kids in our high school, and they were friends with some of my friends. If my dad saw me anywhere near an African American, male or female, say at a football game, I was "read the riot act" and told to never go near "those people" again. In my young adult life, I met gay friends whom I dearly loved. Growing up they were referred to (negatively then) as "queers." 

    Prejudice is both blatant and insidious.

        Leta

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