Fear/hatred of the different.

[Xamonas Chegwé]

I was just thinking in a meandering way and I think I hit upon a little insight.

Why do we instinctively (especially as children) dislike and even fear those that are a little different from us? Why are geeks, weirdos, short kids, kids with funny ears, disabled kids, kids that lisp etc. routinely bullied at school? Look, there's a funny looking kid, let's beat him up!

I think it is evolutionary. We have evolved to mistrust and be wary of the different. I think that there is a definite evolutionary advantage to this behaviour. The fact is that in a large number of cases, physical deformity or strange behaviour can be symptomatic of illness. It makes sense that when our more primitive, but still social, ancestors were evolving, possibly long before the first primates, the tribes that shunned and excluded members with deformities and odd behaviours would have reduced the risk of contracting infections, whereas those that accepted them would (in some cases) court outbreaks that could decimate their tribe. This would lead to evolutionary pressure in the direction of aggressive and cautious behaviour towards the different.

Obviously there are other pressures in other directions. Sociability and bonding are evolved traits in social animals as well, and ones that would tend to push in the opposite direction and skew this behaviour to only being aggressive to those not closely related or well known to us.

This isn't a properly thought out theory - just something I happened to be musing about. But what do you think? Does it have legs?

[floppit]

I don't know if it's innate or learned because there'd be plenty to learn from. As adults we don't do so much better, while we become more self aware (some!) and inhibit the most obvious rejecting behaviour we still exclude those who are different.

I remember learning about a concept known as 'Unconditional Positive Regard', to give ALL fellow humans positive regard unconditionally, and it pissed me off BIG time. What totally had my back up was the room full of muppets who's minds went instantly to child abusers, a room full of such fecking ijits that they really did think our negative regard is held purely for those where it is justifiable. I have a brother who's a little odd, he has 1 friend, he's nearly 40 and has 1 friend, he's very keen to socialise, not a loner, he's kind, he's HUGELY generous, he's possibly the most honest person you'd ever meet, but in 40 yrs only 1 person out of the thousands who have known him keeps in touch. (My friends do but that is NOT the same). I challanged the room full of people when was the last time someone with LD was invited to one of their social functions - excluding family? Guess what - not one! But there was another student with a similar family member who concurred he had NO friends.

I also remember reading the Social Exclusion reports for mental health, kind of important to me at the time as I worked WITH abused kids where a higher percentage go on to have mental health issues. Same story, exclusion on a mass and measurable scale.

Children are less inhibited, they learn from adults and maybe just mirror our 'under the radar' behaviour.

[Clinton Huxley]

Maybe it's humans trying to establish themselves in a pecking order, from the "Alpha Male" down, like chimps.

Also, I bet there is an element of joining the group and picking on the "weirdo" to forestall being picked on oneself. Tactical bullying.

Or it could just be that kids are, broadly speaking, little bastards.

[JOZeldenrust]

https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/demo/

Seems appropriate.

[Rum]

It is a little too easy to use idealised 'models' of early human life from which to extrapolate theory, but we do it all the time - and I'm going to as well.

Two points on this from my perspective. Firstly in early tribal times it would be advantageous in evolutionary terms to drive out the 'different'. I imagine most disabled children would have been abandoned at best or killed at worst and it may well be that we have that instinct built into us genetically in some way, even though as 'good liberals' we fight that instinct now. Disabled people would be a risk to the genetic 'purity' of the tribe.

The second thing is that as isolated tribes we would instinctively be suspicious of strangers and interlopers and it would be greatly advantageous to doubt their motives and be on guard against the 'different'.

[Pappa]

I think this has been studied / written about a lot already. I'm fairly sure I've read Dawkins talking about it. I'd guess we have an evolutionary distrust of the different which is directed and modified by culture into whichever form is in fashion (xenophobia, etc.). On the flipside though we have other traits like curiosity of the novel which can sometimes work against this.

[Horwood Beer-Master]

...Or it could just be that kids are, broadly speaking, little bastards.

That's it.

[wolfréalt]

Most social animals kill or abandon, weak, malformed, mentally disturbed etc members of their group. This would be just evolutionary for survival of the group. As adults we can look beyond our primal instincts but children would be less able to rationalise such things and are more prone to follow these inherited traits.....

[Feck]

I wonder is there a group size that people feel comfortable in ? How many of Us can there be before some of Us start to become Them ?

Does this change in differing social situations or survival pressures ?

[Horwood Beer-Master]

Most social animals kill or abandon, weak, malformed, mentally disturbed etc members of their group. This would be just evolutionary for survival of the group. As adults we can look beyond our primal instincts but children would be less able to rationalise such things and are more prone to follow these inherited traits...

That's why it's up to adults to teach them better...








...by giving any child who bullys another a good hard kicking.

[wolfréalt]

I wonder is there a group size that people feel comfortable in ? How many of Us can there be before some of Us start to become Them ?

Does this change in differing social situations or survival pressures ?

Maby when you get beyond a size where you can no longer know everybody in the group personally.

[floppit]

I wonder is there a group size that people feel comfortable in ? How many of Us can there be before some of Us start to become Them ?

Does this change in differing social situations or survival pressures ?

I think that would rest on it being something 'real' rather than perceived. I bet BNP supporters consider themselves an 'Us' till of course they're stood opposite ends of a football terrace, when their fellows in in orange and blue (so as not to slur any particular team!) are the 'Us' and the BNP guy down yon end is now 'Them'.

It's as transient as where your feet are plonked at any given moment - no real 'Us' or 'Them'.

Like rape, murder, infanticide, and theft the animal kingdom might elude to it's evolutionary basis but unlike most animals we have much less excuse and that is our reality now much more so than what was a couple of million years ago. I'm not suggesting other comments here suggest otherwise, rather it's something where I generally question the relevance of animal comparison.

[Animavore]

I love things that are different. Its sameness I hate.

I love asking foreigners about where they're from and their language and culture, religion, customs etc...

They don't always reciprocate though

[Sisifo]

I wonder is there a group size that people feel comfortable in ? How many of Us can there be before some of Us start to become Them ?

Does this change in differing social situations or survival pressures ?

That would be the Dunbar's number, I believe. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunbar's_number

As for the rest, I disagree. I would not believe in any "genetically conditioned" behavour that would not be hormonally started (like fear or sexuality). Besides children don't seem to be particularly pro or against anything until a certain age. And if your theory was true, I think it would also show reject to beauty, if it was off the norms. It doesn't happen...
As the described behaviour uses to be shown in front of witness, and towards those who are not just different, but tame or weak, I think it is an exhibition of "I'm strong, I'm an adult" in front of the rest of the pack. And it is a behaviour in some other pack mammals too. In any case, I would bet for primitive social education, more related to imitation than genes.

[Xamonas Chegwé]

I love things that are different. Its sameness I hate.

I love asking foreigners about where they're from and their language and culture, religion, customs etc...

They don't always reciprocate though

That's cos they're bloody foreigners and don't understand a word you say.

Hang on, come to tink of it, not many of us do either!