A Class Divided

       In class the other day, we split up our class based on who was wearing black and who was wearing colors. We then made a list of why the other group was wearing what they were wearing. By doing that, we automatically were making judgments about the other people, assuming something about them that we didn't know for sure, just based on how they look. Eventually the reasons on our lists started to get a little ridiculous, but I think that's how prejudices come about in real life. People feel ownership of their own groups and make assumptions about others because if you don't know someone, all you have to go off of is how they look. So people see a person who looks a certain way do something and then they start to think other people who look that way will do that too. This is a horrible way to view people you don't know, and I'm not sure why people do this. Based on the video we watched, sometimes it's an authority figure that influences prejudices. The teacher was the one who told the kids the blue eyed kids were better and how the brown-eyed kids were to be treated. Someone who is influential with power has the ability to turn large numbers of people against a group. Some of the worst moments in our history occurred because someone with power convinced others that a certain group is less than them.