Page - 98 - in Reflective Cosmopolitanism - Educating towards inclusive communities through Philosophical Enquiry

98 REfLECTIvE COsMOPOLITANIsM deciding if Christian can play in the team. That is what we could call prejudice. A prejudice is a pre-judgement, usually not positive, according to ways of thinking already set in place, or according to generalizations, without giving it further thought and without really knowing about what we are judging. We have a tendency towards prejudice because it allows us to apply generalizations or categories that can quickly help us simplify and organize the world we live in. In a globalized world, where there is a lot of information to process; prejudices may help us think faster and more easily. Prejudices are there, and it is almost impossible not to have them. The problem arises when our prejudices become inflexible, definite judgments, and if we consistently use prejudice as a rule or criteria to assess or judge any situation (it is in this moment when we give the pre-judgement the pejorative meaning of prejudice). From our cosmopolitan approach, the problem with prejudice is that it ends up justifying discrimi- nation towards certain people for the sole reason that they belong to a certain group, without taking into consideration their individual characteristics. You can find further resources on the concept of “prejudice” in the manual to Ella, episode 2, leading idea 5 “Prejudices” exercises and discussion plans; and the manual to In and out the park, episode 5, leading idea 2 “The pre-judgment-prejudice”. Discussion Plan: Generalizations that lead us to prejudice. Are they useful? 1. How do you organize your music, books or clothes? Do you establish catego- ries? Based on what? 2. If you go to a bookshop and find a book in the adventure section, is it possible to have a general idea of the plot without reading it? Why? 3. Do all the books in the adventure section have certain characteristics in com- mon? Which? 4. Could we generalize and say that all adventure novels are the same or merely similar? 5. If someone tells you that they have read an adventure novel, does that help you know what kind of book it was? Why? 6. If you like adventure novels and you find a book in the adventure section, does that mean you have to necessarily like it? If you don’t like it, does that mean it is not an adventure novel? 7. If you like adventure novels, does that mean that you don’t like any novel in particular? 8. Would it be useful to generalize about books when referring to them? Why? Would that be a judgment or prejudice? 9. Are all members of a certain group or category the same, or do they simply share some characteristics? 10. Would generalizing about people when referring to them be useful? Why? 11. What would happen if we never generalized? Would organizing in your daily life be easier or more difficult? 12. Would it be more or less comfortable? 13. Does generalizing help you simplify the experiences you go through? Can that lead to over-simplifying? 14. If so, what is the risk or the problem? 15. Can there be helpful generalizations and harmful ones? How can we differenti- ate them? 16. When generalization is harmful, can it generate prejudice?