Wednesday, March 30, 2005

You Hate Old People

I do too. Also, you're not that keen on Blacks either. I guess we have that in common as well. Or perhaps this isn't new information for some of you. Maybe a handful of you are thinking, "Is Laura psychic? I fcuking hate old people! And, please, unless you have all day, don't get me started on the Blacks. I am so over the Blacks and all the black things they do. Makes me sick."

For the rest of you, however, this may come as a surprise.

My copy of Blink arrived sometime last week. I mentioned the book in previous post. It deals with our split-second decision making process and how we may not always be aware of all the forces at play when we make such decisions, or that decisions that we supposedly put a lot of thought into, were actually made in a few seconds. For example, if you meet someone for the first time, you automatically make assumptions about that person and mentally categorize them without being conscious of that.

The book is rife with examples, but if you want to test the theory out for yourself, you can. I did it yesterday and discovered I had a bias toward young people over old people, white people to black people, and John Kerry to George Bush.

Granted, old people look as if they've been left in water for too long, but you'd think the fact they'd be more likely to bake you cookies would somehow even it out. It doesn't.

Wanna see how you fare? The type of test is called the Implicit Association Test. According to Gladwell, it was devised by Anthony G. Greenwald, Mahzarin Banaji, and Brian Nosek. To take it online, click here.

Try the demonstrations. You can read the theory behind the tests on the website.

Let me know how racist and ageist you are when you're done.

1 comment:

Redlobo said...

I do not think a bunch of tests have to tell me that I am a mild racist and ageist. Every time I see my Grandmother I just wanna punch her in the face. "I just made a stinky" "Thats good Grandma, I'll change your diaper in a second okay." She tells me this every freaking day, and calls me Frank. My NAME IS NOT FRANK you bitch its Edward. E-D-W-A-R-D!

I can tell that I am mildly racist because I love to print or write on white paper. Writing on black paper is something I really hate to do. Perhaps I became racist because in school the teacher was always writing on the "black" board with the "white" chalk. Another way whitey keeps all the darkies down. See I told you I was racist.

However every time I see Laura coming towards me down the street I turn around toward the 10 black men in baggie pants with "Kill Whitey" on their t-shirts. Maybe I am only prejudice to Comics?