What prejudice is most serious in your community?

[struggle4progress]

America is a land of many prejudices.

Many of these prejudices pass unnoticed unless one is directly affected by them: depending on one's status, for example, one might be keenly aware of anti-intellectual bias but miss anti-blue-collar bias -- or vice-versa.

When I was growing up in the South, racial prejudice was common and often openly expressed. But there was also a virulent hostility towards people with "foreign" accents, among which were included the "foreign" accents of people who came to town from other parts of the USA and who were often asked "What country are you from?" It was not uncommon for carloads of guys to shout insults at women whom they considered unattractive. And anyone who dressed in an unusual way was just asking for an unpleasant surprise: during the late sixties and early seventies, for example, thrown beer bottles frequently greeted anyone in hippie garb.

The usual conservative religious intolerance was expressed not only towards atheists and other non-Christians but included main-stream Christian sects unfamiliar to the local yahoos. And there was also an intolerance of other non-mainstream views: expressing abstract support for unions could get you fired; people become spitting mad about anti-war sentiments, about ideas they considered "Marxist," about women's liberation and the Equal Rights Amendment, or and so on.

I'm inclined to regard prejudice as more serious, when it has more serious consequences. So a prejudice that mocks someone is passing seems different from a prejudice that produces constantly bullies a person; a prejudice that sputters angrily seems different from a prejudice that threatens violence or physically attacks.

[Colobo]

1. Here in Tampa, I would say class.

[EFerrari]

2. I voted class but really meant poverty.

[mitchtv]

3. I live near the border with Mexico

Mex's and MexAms are facing a lot of racist hate. Crimes against gays are also a problem. Latins have a lot worse however.

[jgraz]

4. Definitely it would be minority political opinion

Of course in Berkeley, that means anyone with a W sticker on their car. Or a Hillary sticker ;)

[H2O Man]

5. I voted "class,"

though in this area, that includes a lot of overlap with other issues (race, etc).

[TahitiNut]

17. I think the overlap exists in most/all places.

Clearly, while there's a tendency for the human animal to fear the "other," I believe class/economics drives the majority of such divisions.

[Raine]

6. Minority prejudice

I'm in a white bread 'burb of Los Angeles County. Here lots of people hire hispanics to be nannies, gardners and handymen which is fine but once they leave the job the police make sure they "escort" (aka/harass) them out of the area, no lingering allowed. x(

[Trillo]

7. Education

seems to be missing.

[Blue_In_AK]

8. Probably race here...

Conflicts between Natives and whites.

[PassingFair]

9. Non-majority religion.

My daughters get crap for not being christian.

It was so bad last year that they MADE UP a story about
their religious past just to pacify the natives.

[madrchsod]

10. illegals

it`s all about illegals

[sandnsea]

11. race, foreigners, illegals

Which I think is all race. Luckily they're all a bunch of pinheads who don't vote anyway.

[nosmokes]

12. Going by the LTEs for the last few months it's bias against cyclists.

Fo real. A little while back there was a cyclist killed by a log truck driver on one of the major but narrow county rural roads. Lane county is a real haven for riding being fairly flat and scenic. But ever since that death it seems there has been a veritable war between some motorists who feel that cyclists have no right to use a paved road at all and some cyclists that go so far as to purposefully ride 4 or 5 abreast to block a complete lane and inflame the situation. There have even been a couple of LTEs from motorists advocating*accidentally* running down cyclists, one from a guy stating that he just checked his insurance policies to make sure he'd be covered. Some people...

[goodgd_yall]

13. Minority political perspective

I've returned to the community I spent most of my growing up in, so this is not an opinion with much experience behind it. Most people where I live (nr Sacramento) seem to be Republican, at least the white population. There is prejudice against liberals, but not that I can see in an outward violent way. I have a "War Is Not the Answer" bumpersticker on my car and I haven't been harassed for it that I can tell (no telling if the occasional pickup driver who revs his engine and passes me is just doing it because he's in a hurry, or trying to make a statement). I have extremely short hair, like a Buddhist's and I haven't gotten crap for it, mostly I think because people err on the side of "oh, maybe she has cancer." Thankfully, the community is much more racially mixed than it was when I was growing up, but I don't think the white old-timers are happy with that.

Edit: Meant to mention that many people in my community are ex-military or children of military. There used to be 3 operating military installations here.

[LWolf]

14. In this small community,

it has to be religious prejudice. There is, of course, some of all present, but that is the most significant.

[angrycarpenter]

15. I voted other

Because there was no all of the above. I got in A discussion with A delivery guy the other day who had said that "they" had made us take "our flag" off the state capital. I puzzled for A second until I realized he meant the rebel flag. So I said it was the right thing to do because to most people it meant racism even if it meant something else to you. This man went ballistic. He went on A rant where he blamed every group he could think of for the problems in this country and finished off with "and every democrat should be lined up and shot". The only thing I could think of to say to that was "well I am A lifelong democrat and you have A nice day" and walked away. Some minds cannot be changed no matter what and in this heat I haven't the energy to try.

[Greyhound]

16. While we have an abundance of all of them, I had to vote class.

It is ubiquitous and crosses over, or supersedes, all of the others. Even within the communities that are victims of prejudice, the class divides are prevalent.

[deadmessengers]

18. Religion. No question about it.

Around here, the fastest way to get yourself ostracized is for you to make it known that you're not a Protestant. Catholics and Jews are somewhat tolerated, but not really accepted. Muslims are viewed as terrorists until proven otherwise, which of course is only possible to do by converting to an evangelical Christian sect. Hindus are generally lumped in with Muslims out of sheer ignorance (brown people, and all that). And forget it if you're something really "out there", like Buddhist, pagan, Deist, atheist or agnostic.

Yep, it's definitely religion.

[treestar]

19. Race

I hear from white people who have been on juries with minority defendants, and often hear how obvious it was the defendant was guilty but another juror of defendant's race would not agree and much frustration expressed at the unreasonableness of said minority juror.

[Warren DeMontague]

20. Poll after poll shows More Merkins would vote for a Woman, African American, even an axe murderer

before they would vote for an Atheist for president.

Frankly, I think that's easily the worst prejudice we have in many parts of this society.

[Nikia]

21. There seems to be a strong prejudice against Mexicans here

This is especially true since there isn't much of a permanent Hispanic population here. In the summer though, there are a lot of migrants who tend to be poorer than Mexican immigrants with permanent jobs.

[Jed Dilligan]

22. Right now, in Sacramento

where I moved not long ago, the biggest story in prejudice news is conflict between Slavic (Russian/Ukrainian) evangelicals and the GLBT community. There was a hate murder (Russian on gay) last month, and they're still preaching homophobia in the Russian churches and sending protestors to the gay district on club nights.

Growing up here in the 80s I would have said race--it used to be a very Republican, very racist (even anti-Semitic) community back then. It's really shaped up, though. Our PD is one of the better urban forces when it comes to profiling, etc. (and I NEVER have good things to say about cops!) and downtown in particular has become very integrated.