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  • Essay / Anti-Immigrant Prejudice Through the Lens of Evolutionary Psychology

    Social psychology is a field focused on exploring theories from anthropology based on the behavior of a collective group in response to a particular situation, to one's environment or to one's individual responses to being part of it. of a group. Evolutionary psychology theories about the adaptation of human behavior from a historical perspective, resulting from environmental factors and influences as well as natural selection. This essay will explore the evolutionary psychology that has been socialized into current intergroup behavior in the face of prejudice faced by immigrants. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on 'Why violent video games should not be banned'? Get the original essay The first notable example of prejudice against immigrants may date back to the Atlantic slave trade, when people were captured in Africa and brought across the ocean. in order to be sold as slaves in exchange for goods. Of course, this is more akin to human trafficking than immigration, but the prejudice that comes with it is why it is deeply ingrained in social constructs to tolerate hatred towards immigrants. Black people from Africa would be gathered into their tribes through traders and brought to the coast to be exchanged for goods, then packed into a ship as if they were just livestock rather than human beings, taken away across the Atlantic and marketed. again for goods before being auctioned off for people to buy as slaves. They were forced to work on plantations or in houses with the sole hope of one day being able to buy their own freedom from their owners. Prejudice against black people in America is persistent, with blacks only recently winning their battle for basic civil rights through the movement started by a simple act of Rosa Parks refusing to give up her seat on a bus and later led by Martin Luther . King, Jr. This prejudiced reaction between groups is the result of conformity over the years to the cultural norm of the time when they were still considered slaves. A survey by Smith, Bond, and Kagitcibasi in 2006 found that even in cases of conformity having a negative impact, people have difficulty resisting the idea of ​​settling for group norms, which explains why people are more willing to allow this type of behavior to develop. place. This is an evolutionary response that has become a social theory. There are currently two examples of immigration bias. First, there is Trump's ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) program, in which he is currently rounding up visa-free immigrants and sending them back to their home countries. His treatment of immigrants is horrific with the creation of "Trump Camps", which are essentially concentration camps, where people are forced to sleep on the ground by the hundreds in a confined space, denying them basic human rights such as access to clean water and adequate sanitation, with reports of people resorting to clean water in desperation. They are denied any phone calls or internet access, as well as the money to use these items so they can seek help. Organizations have been set up to prevent this from happening, but without access from camps and ICE centers, more often than not, people are sent back to places where they potentially face death. Some children are separatedfrom their families and sent to camps where they are given psychiatric medication in an attempt to control and calm them. By instilling fear in people, essentially politically brainwashing groups such as minorities, immigrants and the majority population, it allows a state of abandonment to the idea of ​​ethnocentrism that Trump advocates and to his authoritarian personality which promotes the stigmatization of specific groups of people. in this case, Muslims and people from Islamic countries. This is a prime example of fascism and what is currently happening in the United States could be compared to the holocaust. Theodor Adorno and Else Frenkel-Brunswick proposed the authoritarian personality theory and explained it as a person with the role of promoting the far-right ideology of fascism (1950). In addition to this, many people also entered the UK from countries such as Syria and Middle Eastern countries after the UK's foreign involvement. Immigration is the result of politics, and prejudice against immigrants is a programmed response that is the product of years of generally right-wing groups teaching nations to respond with this type of behavior. Intergroup behavior between immigrants and natives of the country often causes conflicts due to dogmatism. Michael A. Hogg and Graham M. Vaughan stated: “From the perspective of personality theories, prejudice reduction involves a change in the personality of the person who is prejudiced. Specifically, this would involve ensuring that certain parental child-rearing strategies are avoided in order to prevent the creation of fanatical people. Essentially, prejudice is a response conditioned by evolutionary psychology, passed down from generation to generation. While collectively this is a societal outcome, it is also a parental outcome, with parents having a responsibility to break away from the conformity that has allowed stigma and prejudice to persist and begin to create a new social norm, which does not allow prejudice. marginalized groups to tolerate. Without people willing to conform to old societal rules, authoritarian figures like Trump and Hitler would not have the ability to thrive in a social group attempting to rewrite the rules of history. In some cases, it's the immigrants who steal the show. indigenous lands, even if this is generally the case only for whites in the position of immigrants. Perhaps this is where some of the fear and prejudice against immigrants comes from, in that throughout history, white people who immigrated have also treated native people unfairly. For example, Christopher Columbus “discovered” the Americas as well as the criminal justice system in the United Kingdom, resulting in criminals being sent to Australia. In the case of the Americas, Columbus essentially had his men rape the lands of the Native Americans, intentionally spreading disease among the people in an attempt to reduce the population, then killing the men and raping the women who survived. Even today, America's indigenous peoples are deeply oppressed and struggle to protect what little land they have left. While America's social system is capitalist, intent on profiting by any means necessary, indigenous peoples strive to revere the land they are on, rather than taking it for all it's worth. . Perhaps it was this kindness and desire to respect each other and the earth as equals that was why Columbus was able to be so brutal, but..