Betty

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Cyndi Richards

  The fascinating article from a NON-PARTISAN mainstream publication that follows below is bound to be quite controversial, and contains some very interesting linkage to other related pieces, so I will refrain from personal editorial commentary, except to declare a resounding DUH!

  Read on and discuss?

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There's no gentle way to put it: People who give in to racism and prejudice may simply be dumb, according to a new study that is bound to stir public controversy.

The research finds that children with low intelligence are more likely to hold prejudiced attitudes as adults. These findings point to a vicious cycle, according to lead researcher Gordon Hodson, a psychologist at Brock University in Ontario. Low-intelligence adults tend to gravitate toward socially conservative ideologies, the study found. Those ideologies, in turn, stress hierarchy and resistance to change, attitudes that can contribute to prejudice, Hodson wrote in an email to LiveScience.

"Prejudice is extremely complex and multifaceted, making it critical that any factors contributing to bias are uncovered and understood," he said.

Controversy ahead

The findings combine three hot-button topics.

"They've pulled off the trifecta of controversial topics," said Brian Nosek, a social and cognitive psychologist at the University of Virginia who was not involved in the study. "When one selects intelligence, political ideology and racism and looks at any of the relationships between those three variables, it's bound to upset somebody."

Polling data and social and political science research do show that prejudice is more common in those who hold right-wing ideals that those of other political persuasions, Nosek told LiveScience. [7 Thoughts That Are Bad For You]

"The unique contribution here is trying to make some progress on the most challenging aspect of this," Nosek said, referring to the new study. "It's not that a relationship like that exists, but why it exists."

Brains and bias

Earlier studies have found links between low levels of education and higher levels of prejudice, Hodson said, so studying intelligence seemed a logical next step. The researchers turned to two studies of citizens in the United Kingdom, one that has followed babies since their births in March 1958, and another that did the same for babies born in April 1970. The children in the studies had their intelligence assessed at age 10 or 11; as adults ages 30 or 33, their levels of social conservatism and racism were measured. [Life's Extremes: Democrat vs. Republican]

In the first study, verbal and nonverbal intelligence was measured using tests that asked people to find similarities and differences between words, shapes and symbols. The second study measured cognitive abilities in four ways, including number recall, shape-drawing tasks, defining words and identifying patterns and similarities among words. Average IQ is set at 100.

Social conservatives were defined as people who agreed with a laundry list of statements such as "Family life suffers if mum is working full-time," and "Schools should teach children to obey authority." Attitudes toward other races were captured by measuring agreement with statements such as "I wouldn't mind working with people from other races." (These questions measured overt prejudiced attitudes, but most people, no matter how egalitarian, do hold unconscious racial biases; Hodson's work can't speak to this "underground" racism.)

As suspected, low intelligence in childhood corresponded with racism in adulthood. But the factor that explained the relationship between these two variables was political: When researchers included social conservatism in the analysis, those ideologies accounted for much of the link between brains and bias.

People with lower cognitive abilities also had less contact with people of other races.

"This finding is consistent with recent research demonstrating that intergroup contact is mentally challenging and cognitively draining, and consistent with findings that contact reduces prejudice," said Hodson, who along with his colleagues published these results online Jan. 5 in the journal Psychological Science.

A study of averages

Hodson was quick to note that the despite the link found between low intelligence and social conservatism, the researchers aren't implying that all liberals are brilliant and all conservatives stupid. The research is a study of averages over large groups, he said.

"There are multiple examples of very bright conservatives and not-so-bright liberals, and many examples of very principled conservatives and very intolerant liberals," Hodson said.

Nosek gave another example to illustrate the dangers of taking the findings too literally.

"We can say definitively men are taller than women on average," he said. "But you can't say if you take a random man and you take a random woman that the man is going to be taller. There's plenty of overlap."

Nonetheless, there is reason to believe that strict right-wing ideology might appeal to those who have trouble grasping the complexity of the world.

"Socially conservative ideologies tend to offer structure and order," Hodson said, explaining why these beliefs might draw those with low intelligence. "Unfortunately, many of these features can also contribute to prejudice."

In another study, this one in the United States, Hodson and Busseri compared 254 people with the same amount of education but different levels of ability in abstract reasoning. They found that what applies to racism may also apply to homophobia. People who were poorer at abstract reasoning were more likely to exhibit prejudice against gays. As in the U.K. citizens, a lack of contact with gays and more acceptance of right-wing authoritarianism explained the link. [5 Myths About Gay People Debunked]

Simple viewpoints

Hodson and Busseri's explanation of their findings is reasonable, Nosek said, but it is correlational. That means the researchers didn't conclusively prove that the low intelligence caused the later prejudice. To do that, you'd have to somehow randomly assign otherwise identical people to be smart or dumb, liberal or conservative. Those sorts of studies obviously aren't possible.

The researchers controlled for factors such as education and socioeconomic status, making their case stronger, Nosek said. But there are other possible explanations that fit the data. For example, Nosek said, a study of left-wing liberals with stereotypically naïve views like "every kid is a genius in his or her own way," might find that people who hold these attitudes are also less bright. In other words, it might not be a particular ideology that is linked to stupidity, but extremist views in general.

"My speculation is that it's not as simple as their model presents it," Nosek said. "I think that lower cognitive capacity can lead to multiple simple ways to represent the world, and one of those can be embodied in a right-wing ideology where 'People I don't know are threats' and 'The world is a dangerous place'. ... Another simple way would be to just assume everybody is wonderful."

Prejudice is of particular interest because understanding the roots of racism and bias could help eliminate them, Hodson said. For example, he said, many anti-prejudice programs encourage participants to see things from another group's point of view. That mental exercise may be too taxing for people of low IQ.

"There may be cognitive limits in the ability to take the perspective of others, particularly foreigners," Hodson said. "Much of the present research literature suggests that our prejudices are primarily emotional in origin rather than cognitive. These two pieces of information suggest that it might be particularly fruitful for researchers to consider strategies to change feelings toward outgroups," rather than thoughts.

Cyndi Richards

(Chew on THAT one, George W. Bush and Rick Parry!)

MEMORANDUM

TO:                 Texas A&M University Faculty, Staff, Students and Administrators

SUBJECT:     Commitment to Equal Employment Opportunity/Affirmative Action for Minorities,

Women, Individuals with Disabilities and Veterans

Texas A&M University is committed to providing equal opportunity and access to the programs, services and employment offered through our university.  A top priority of this administration is to create an environment which supports diversity campus wide and increases awareness of the globally connected world in which we live for faculty, staff and students.  To help meet this priority, all university employees have the responsibility to create an environment in which individuals are treated with dignity and respect and are afforded equal treatment under the law. Moreover, we must all be held accountable for achieving this goal.

To promote this commitment, and in compliance with Executive Order 11246, the university has developed an Affirmative Action Program that documents the policies, practices and procedures to support equal treatment for all applicants and employees and assure, in good faith, equal access and affirmative action for women, minorities, individuals with disabilities and veterans at all levels of its workforce.  It is our policy to not discriminate in employment opportunities or practices on the basis of race, sex, color, national origin, religion, age, disability, veteran status, genetic information, or any other characteristic protected by law.  Furthermore, we will maintain a work environment free from discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression.

Please help me foster diversity by doing your part, through your actions and statements, to support our goals of equal employment opportunity, equal access and affirmative action.  The university’s Affirmation Action Program document may be viewed on the Human Resources website at http://employees.tamu.edu/managers/hiring/affirmativeAction online.  If you have any questions about this memorandum or our affirmative action program, please contact Kathryn Symank, Associate Vice President for Human Resource and Administrative Services, at k-symank@tamu.edu, or 979.862.4572.

(signed)

Dr. R. Bowen Loftin

President

Cyndi Richards

Dear URNA friends, what follows comes from one of the major LGBT blogs in the country, the "Bilerico Project", and is so incredible that I felt compelled to respond in their voluminous comment section with my own very passionate feelings, but if you want to read them, please go there.

I am sharing this sad-but-true news item for your consideration in the hopes that it will stimulate a bit of thought and discusion from folks HERE.

For more clarity, click the links in the story.

Read on, and you know where to share your thoughts.

Dan Savage & the Circular Firing Squad

Filed By John M. Becker | January 24, 2012 4:00 PM | 15 comments

Filed in: The Movement

So Dan Savage was glitterbombed yesterday for the third time by LGBT activists. I can't tell you how much this dismays me.

It's true that Dan Savage has made offensive remarks in the past. I'm not denying, explaining, justifying, or defending that, because a.) it's not my place to speak for him, and b.) Dan has already addressed them himself. I'm also not in any way trying to minimize or downplay what I have no doubt is the very real, acute pain that anti-trans bigotry causes, or the way anti-trans language, regardless of intent, reinforces that bigotry.

Look: as a gay man, not to mention a married one, I am keenly aware of the sting of bigotry. I feel it every day, both through my own life experiences and those that I encounter in my work with Truth Wins Out. As much as anti-gay bigotry hurts, though - as heavily as it weighs on my heart, and as much as I abhor the construction of a hierarchy of oppression - I recognize the privilege that I possess as a white, cisgender gay man. I simply cannot fathom the magnitude of the journey my trans kinfolk are on, nor do I possess a vocabulary sufficient to convey my admiration for the courage it takes each and every one of my trans friends to be true to hirself and to own, embrace, and love that truth.

But Savage's glitterbombing still disturbs me profoundly. The reason? Dan Savage is not the enemy.

As Bil points out, trans people are not alone in their journey. All of us cisgendered individuals - even those of us in the LGBT movement - are on a journey too, into an ever-greater understanding of the perspectives and experiences that our trans siblings bring to the table and the unique issues, circumstances, and difficulties they face.

Our movement is most effective when we fight forcefully for our human rights and dignities against those who oppress us while at the same time dispelling misconceptions by telling the stories of our lives, educating people about our orientations/identities/expressions and the injustices we face because of them, and awakening in all of us the realization of our common humanity and the fundamental rights and protections to which that humanity entitles us.

Even the most outspoken and well-intentioned of us have warts. But Dan Savage is not a trans enemy. Warts and all, his heart is in the right place and he is an ally in the struggle for equality on behalf of our entire community - lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender.

What's more, Savage is one of the most visible members of our community. He has a high profile that almost none of the rest of us have, and that enables him to be an especially forceful advocate for the LGBT movement. Absolutely nothing is gained by attacking him; if anything, those who engage in these repeated attacks run the serious risk of silencing one of our most powerful assets.

All of us, including the so-called "trans mafia," should take care to remember who our real enemies are. It shouldn't be too hard; there are plenty of them. Instead of directing our frustration and anger inwards at obviously supportive and well-meaning community members who have a less-than-immaculate record on every single LGBT issue, we need to direct it outwards and upwards towards the Tony Perkinses, Rick Santorums, Keith Ablows, and Laura Ingrahams of the world. Instead of vilifying people for what they don't fully understand, we need to meet them where they are and bring them further.

Circular firing squads cut all of us down, and guess what? After the last shot is fired, our enemies are still standing.

Let's be better than that. Our rights and our lives depend on it.

Kerrilyn Am...

Well so far I am pretty excited about 2012!  I've been fortunate to have my immediate and extended family around me and they are all loving and supportive.  Things got setback a bit on the move, but I am still moving to Boston as soon as I am setup to do so.  I've been out quite a bit with family and friends doing everything from "Girl's Day Out" to shopping, to seeing some awesome live music (blues and jazz), and a few parties with friends as well.

I have some loose ends to tie up and will be happy to have those things out of the way.  The medical is going along well.  I've made some new friends...

Clothes/shoe/bling/accessory-wise, I am now pretty happy with my wardrobe.  I am fortunate in that my oldest daughter and I are close enough in clothes and shoe size to swap outfits now and then.  This is always nice, because it gives us both an expanded choice of outfits/shoes.

I do want to take a minute here also and say "HI!" and "THANKS!" to all my sisters (and brothers) here at URNA.  I've made some good friends and met some awesome people from around the world on here.  This is a great support group to me, because it encompasses the entire umbrella, and we discuss so many different things.  We can be serious, or sarcastic, or plain out funny.  I welcome all the new members and salute the ones who have been here for so long and made this a great place to meet and hang out!

I love making new friends both here at URNA and out and about in life.  I also believe in trying to give back for what I was given... that or "pay forward".  So I do encourage new sisters to chat with me or email if they have questions.

Love,

~Kerrilyn