On the racism thing:

A few things occur. Networking technology makes the world smaller. Kids can communicate directly with a variety of people their own age. Often internationally. They have more independent sources of information with which to compare the local cultural assumptions they inherit. Education isn’t necessarily better but it is more available and accessible.

Also, warfare is different. Largely a voluntary occupation in prosperous nations. The pressure to uphold a military tradition is gone in many communities. This makes long running provincial stand offs less tenacious. As neighboring communities begin to equalize in prosperity and share common interests their conflicts are less relevant.

Related to the first point, minority groups are taking the bull by the horns more and more. Asserting their equality by whatever means there are. People don’t necessarily respect each other on principle but most people respect success and power. Some bigots are hardened and implacable but a lot of racism is just lazy generalization. The latter gets chipped away every time there is a precedent like, say, a black president.

As for what makes a self a self… that’s a whole other thread.

JKapp - it’s good to see you posting again. I’m sorry I didn’t get to see you this summer when I passed through North Carolina.  Hope all is going well.

J Kapp - 12 January 2012 12:55 PM

GAD - 12 January 2012 11:38 AM

saralynn - 12 January 2012 11:10 AM

Dennis: Not genetically, Gad, culturally.

Isn’t that exactly what GAD is saying?  Kids haven’t changed, but what they are taught has changed.

Yes, thank you! 

What we are taught doesn’t account for everything. I was taught to be a good Moravian Christian. Then I became an agnostic before I ever met an irreligious person. You could say that you guys (the older generation) have put into motion the cultural landscape that has allowed us to change. That, along with the teaching you provide us, has allow sweeping changes.

I agree with this assessment.  I think our attitudes toward basic issues like gender and race are set very early.  I was born in the era just before women’s lib.  I came to agree with the ideas of equal opportunity for the sexes, but I still bought into the weaker sex idea personally.  However, my husband and I demonstrated fairly mixed roles to our kids, with both of us working and sharing in household duties.  This, along with what our kids heard in society in general molded them into expecting much more equality between the sexes.  And they believe that more viscerally; whereas, I believe it more intellectually.

Dennis Campbell - 12 January 2012 01:16 PM

Can what you learn during your developing years—from your parents, your community, your peers, and from negotiating social realities, as well as formal education and indoctrination—be clearly distinct from who you are?

No.  Could try a longer response but that’s basically it.

Nature versus nurture.  Maybe we should start another thread…I think both are part of who “you” are, but they are distinct influences.  Bigredfutbol, did you mean to ask whether the inherited elements could steer you in a different direction from the cultural elements?

I think Betty White has the best perspective on misogyny: “Why do people say “Grow some balls”? Balls are weak and sensitive! If you really wanna get tough, grow a vagina! Those things take a pounding!”

Ecurb Noselrub - 12 January 2012 07:59 PM

I think Betty White has the best perspective on misogyny: “Why do people say “Grow some balls”? Balls are weak and sensitive! If you really wanna get tough, grow a vagina! Those things take a pounding!”

OH SNAP!

hannahfriend - 12 January 2012 07:25 PM

Bigredfutbol, did you mean to ask whether the inherited elements could steer you in a different direction from the cultural elements?

Well, GAD had argued that it’s wrong to assert that generational differences are anything other than changes in cultural values, because biologically and genetically we don’t change—from generation to generation, we’re the same species, born with the same human nature. Dennis then responded that generations changed culturally, not biologically, and then Sarah argued that that’s what GAD meant.

These were all valid points—I was essentially trying to say that while human nature may remain constant, our personalities begin to be formed by circumstance from birth on…to say that “people don’t change, just their values and beliefs” raises the question of whether or not you, or I, or anyone can be said to be distinct from our beliefs and values. If I had been born 200 years ago, surely some of my qualities would still exist because of my DNA and so forth, but I would not have grown up to be the same person because I would have grown up with different social and cultural values, and of course I would have had different personal experiences as well. I would not be the same person.

I didn’t do a very good job of expressing it, if only because I don’t know much about developmental psychology and whatnot.

Ecurb Noselrub - 12 January 2012 07:59 PM

I think Betty White has the best perspective on misogyny: “Why do people say “Grow some balls”? Balls are weak and sensitive! If you really wanna get tough, grow a vagina! Those things take a pounding!”

While this is a fun comment, I think it’s a bit off.  We don’t say “Grow some balls” to a guy when we are telling him to go out and take a pounding, except in a secondary way.  We say it when we’re attempting to shame him into doing some damn fool thing that no person in their right mind would consider, something that could only be inspired by an excess of testosterone.  The result might be that he takes a pounding but he might also gain some glory.  Now when somebody is smart, sensible, and intelligent and refuses to do idiotic things like that, we say to them “Don’t be a pussy.”  The implications are obvious to me….

burt - 17 January 2012 08:37 AM

Ecurb Noselrub - 12 January 2012 07:59 PM

I think Betty White has the best perspective on misogyny: “Why do people say “Grow some balls”? Balls are weak and sensitive! If you really wanna get tough, grow a vagina! Those things take a pounding!”

While this is a fun comment, I think it’s a bit off.  We don’t say “Grow some balls” to a guy when we are telling him to go out and take a pounding, except in a secondary way.  We say it when we’re attempting to shame him into doing some damn fool thing that no person in their right mind would consider, something that could only be inspired by an excess of testosterone.  The result might be that he takes a pounding but he might also gain some glory.  Now when somebody is smart, sensible, and intelligent and refuses to do idiotic things like that, we say to them “Don’t be a pussy.”  The implications are obvious to me….

But being a dick and a cunt are equally derogatory.

burt - 17 January 2012 08:37 AM

While this is a fun comment, I think it’s a bit off.  We don’t say “Grow some balls” to a guy when we are telling him to go out and take a pounding, except in a secondary way.  We say it when we’re attempting to shame him into doing some damn fool thing that no person in their right mind would consider, something that could only be inspired by an excess of testosterone.

In my experience it’s used just like “show some backbone” or “don’t be a coward” ... that sort of thing.

burt - 17 January 2012 08:37 AM

Now when somebody is smart, sensible, and intelligent and refuses to do idiotic things like that, we say to them “Don’t be a pussy.”  The implications are obvious to me….

Your social circles are definitely different from mine in this regard. I’d've included that as a synonym for the above (also “don’t be a wuss” which sounds like a combo-wimp/puss).

There is so much inappropriate stuff on reddit it is amazing.  The language and level of intolerance from some of the people of r/atheism is no better than anywhere else.  I hate to see fellow atheists act that way.  It gives us all a bad name.