Guardian angel spiritual protection from the day of birth

Tag: prejudice

  • Prejudice and stereotypes dictate what is acceptable

    Prejudice and stereotypes dictate the rules of what is acceptable and what is not, and thus mark what social groups expect of people. Prejudice and stereotypes are present in the cultural heritage of every individual and every social group. And they translate into concrete ways of thinking and behaviors that affect daily life in the form of attitudes, affirmations, competitions, trends, and conflicts.

    Specifically, stereotypes are gross simplifications and rigid representations of the reality with which each individual interacts on a daily basis. Prejudices are defined as erroneous or inaccurate judgments, formulated in a superficial way without any knowledge of the subject.

    Social groups are always threatened by what is different. Some common scenarios could see you on the edge of a social context due to a characteristic of yours not shared by the reference social group, due to prejudice or stereotype.

    This is the case of ethnic minorities, the most fragile categories are those of the lowest social-economic background. Unfortunately, today we still live in a society that is not very inclusive of diversity. Not only racial issues, but even gender bias can also be a reason for exclusion from a group.

    Prejudice and stereotypes – the expectations of the group

    Groups have expectations guided by your behavioral manifestations. If you’ve always held a certain role, the people you hang out with will expect you to keep doing it. If until now you’ve always been content with being the shoulder or being the hyper-accommodating person, this is what others will continue to expect from you.

    In other words, marginalization is something that feeds itself, if you have occupied a blurred position in the background of your social context, others will not want anything different from you.

    Your identity matters

    And it cannot ignore your personal history. Identity is what determines who you are, what you want, and where you are headed. To be heard, all you have to do is remind yourself who you are and consequently remind others as well.

    Working on your personal identity is the first step to remove the pain of social rejection. It is completely understandable to feel invisible when the people around you continually refuse to recognize who you are, what your feelings are, and what you need.

    Personal identity is the conception of who we are and how we relate to others. The positive thing is that personal identity is constantly evolving.

  • Religiosity is an important area of ​​individual life

    Religiosity is an important area of ​​individual life and psychology tries to understand its characteristics. Religious experience can receive a push from within or without. Let us try to understand what intrinsic religiosity entails.

    Religious orientation is a fundamental object of investigation for human beings. As it aims to understand how one of the fundamental experiences is lived to answer the existential questions concerning our life. How and why do we respond so differently to these needs? The first difference concerns the source of the spring that pushes us towards religion. Here then is what intrinsic religiosity means.

    Religiosity – a personal and social issue

    A first consideration that must be made when speaking of intrinsic religiosity concerns the sphere that the religious sense occupies in the life of an individual. The term intrinsic can mistakenly lead us to think that it is the personal sphere as opposed to the social one. In reality, intrinsic and extrinsic religiosity are both individual ways of living religion.

    Religion and religiosity in its social being refer to phenomena that include groups, a group identity, and their collective actions. For this, we could ascribe phenomena such as orthodoxy, pacifism, and religious fanaticism. In this sphere at an extreme level and far from true spirituality, we also find religious sects that try to annihilate the individual in a group totally devoted to the holy man.

    The intrinsic orientation

    Inherent religious orientation is a personal way of experiencing spirituality and was described by Gordon Allport. Those who have an intrinsic orientation consider religion as an absolute value on which life rests and which gives value to it. There is no utilitarian intent of religion, only the fulfillment of man.

    These people experience religion as a practice embodied in everyday life and who feel the presence of the Absolute in their existence. Everything then manifests itself as a personal and inner conviction. Allport himself has built a scale to measure the type of religiosity of a person and the intrinsic orientation is traced back to high levels of agreement to such sentences.

    • It is not very important what I believe in, the important thing is to be a good person.
    • It is important for me to spend time in meditation and prayer
    • I often had a strong feeling that God was present.

    Religion and prejudice

    Further consideration of Allport concerns the relationship between religious orientation and the phenomenon of prejudice. Prejudice is a cognitive phenomenon for which a priori beliefs are created about specific groups or people with certain characteristics. According to Allport, intrinsic religiosity becomes the substratum for a more tolerant and open orientation.

    Extrinsic religiosity leads man to use religion for his own purposes (not necessarily evil, only more utilitarian), this leads to a greater propensity to believe that others also have purposes in relating to us regardless of what they really are.