The hardest part about confronting any “isms” on an interpersonal level, is that, inherently our biases are part of our identities. And acknowledging flaws in ourselves and beginning the journey to change is very challenging. Biases are not all bad, but today the power of unconscious biases are resulting in the violent social climate we observe today. We have a big opportunity before us--the opportunity to “unlearn” what society has taught us, that has led to the challenges we face in a very globalized community.

(Un)conscious Biases

We can figure out, to a degree, where our unconscious biases come from; influences come from our environment from our best friends, to our families and our Facebook newsfeed. Recognizing, too, that we have unconscious biases, is helpful to combat them. And the fact of the matter is, we have powerful unconscious biases that influence how we perceive everthing around us and how we treat one another.

As a Chinese-American Adoptee, I have a particular set of experiences that determine my perspective of the world. I have a unique, complex sense of identity and, unlike a majority of my friends, do not know any of my blood relatives. Growing up in New York City, I have often been surrounded by at least a few Chinese adoptees, and at least people who have heard of the One Child Policy and know that it means that my biological parents likely had another child and had to give me up. I already have some biases about a few things, (1) I have a preconceived notion about what "people form New York City are like" as well as (2) I make some assumptions about Chinese-American individuals (for example, I might easier entertain the possibility that they are adopted, as opposed to American Born Chinese (ABC)).

At the same time, individuals will surely have assumptions about me, because I look a certain way, but don't necessarily speak nor act as one would expect someone who looks like me to act. Frankly, if you haven't met many Chinse (or Asian) Americans, you might assume that all people who look Asian/Chinese grew up in that culture.

Those individuals who make assumptions about me or any other non-Eurpoean looking person, are not bad people, they just use their past experience to inform how they interact. And when you think about it, this is how we interact with the world every day. If we did not use past experience to tell us to, for example, look both ways before we cross the street, we would probably get hit by cars often.

However, the power of our biases goes deeper, and their origins are less obvious than the simple examples I explained above. Unconscious biases are ways we engage with the world based on assumtions that we are not aware we have been taught.

The unconcious nature of a biases becomes dangerous when we allow negative biases perpetuate actions that are hurtful, violent and ignorant. For example, not understanding how U.S. society at large has taught, and reinforced a white supremacy in our own upbringing, can result in a complacent attitude towards actions that institutions (or society) takes that reinforce this power dynamic. It is difficult, and I am not removing myself from this fact, to admit one’s own mis-takes and begin to rethink and relearn how we perceive the world.

Social (un)Learning. Awareness is the first step. Recognize what you are being taught and work to unlearn it.

Jane Elliot, famous for her Blue eyes/Brown Eyes exercise that teaches people how discrimination manifests by separating people by eye color and demonstrating oppression by treating people with blue eyes as inferior to brown eyes, expresses how society is institutionally teaching us how to be racist. She was featured on Oprah’s show in 1992 spoke to systemic racism.

“We are educated by a racist school system, that only teaches us about white contributions…if we would start telling the truth in schools, we would not have racism, we could cure racism in this country… Racism is not part of the human condition. Racism is a learned response, you have to be taught to be a racist, you are not born a racist. You are born into a racist society….and like anything else, if you can learn it you can unlearn…but people like this [referring to a white male] choose not to unlearn it because they are afraid they will lose power if they share it with other people. We are afraid of sharing power.”

I am reading this book Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking, by Malcolm Gladwell (2005) and he discusses our internal biases and how our brains function on an unconscious level. There is a psychological test called the Implicit Association Test (IAT) that gives us insights into our unconscious bases by measuring how long it takes for us to respond to associating various words and images. The study poses questions such as: How fast do we associate "positive words" with "European" people versus "negative words" with "African Americans."

"The disturbing thing about the test is that is shows that our unconscious attitudes may be utterly incompatible with our stated conscious values. As it turns out, for example, of the fifty thousand African Americans who have taken the Race IAT so far, about half of them, like me [Malcolm Gladwell], have stronger associations with whites than with blacks. How could we not? We live in North America, where we are surrounded every day by cultural messages linking white with good. 'You don't choose to make positive associations with the dominant group,' says Mahzarin Banaji, who teachings psychology at Harvard University and is one of the leaders in IAT research. 'But you are required to. All around you, that group is being paired with good things. You open the newspaper and you turn on the television, and you can't escape it.'," (Gladwell, 85).

With this knowledge comes the responsibility, I believe, to do something about it. The question, I have for us then is this:What conditions must we foster to build proper social associations?Better yet,How can we help each other learn more positive associations?This is by far a much larger question than we have time for today, but consider them.

Our unconscious bases manifest themselves in the smallest of ways, that have grand impacts. Gladwell, again points to how this occurs. In psychology this could be referred to as self-fulfiling prophecy.

"In all likelihood, you won't be aware that you're behaving any differently than you would around a white person. but chances are you'll lean forward a little less, turn away slightly from him or her, close your body a bit, be a bit less expressive, maintain less eye contact, stand a little farther away, smile a lot less, hesitate and stumble over your words a bit more, laugh at jokes a bit less. Does that matter? Of course it does... [suppose the context is a black male applicant in a job interview]...He's going to pick up on the uncertainty and distance, and that may well make him a little less certain of himself, a little less confident, and a little less friendly. And what will you do then? You may well get a gut feeling that the applicant doesn't really have what it takes, or maybe he is a bit standoffish, or maybe he doesn't really want the job. what this unconscious first impression will do, in other words, is throw the interview hopelessly off course," (Gladwell, 86).

[Our unconscious biases are evident in the news today. Consider how many unarmed African American men and women are being shot because there is fear and an association that African American folks are inherantly "dangerous" and "criminals." Click here for a recent example from Tulsa, OK last week.]

So,

Take-With-Yous

1. Use the resources available to you to learn as much as you can about the narrative you’ve been told. The World Wide Web connects you to more than just people. And don’t just assume everything is a lie (everything in moderation), but recognize that every story, has a bias and is probably not the “full story.”

2. You are not perfect, no one is. It is your duty to grow and be better than you were yesterday. Know that failure and growth are a part of life, and if you are not messing up—and more importantly learning from those mistakes, than you are not really doing yourself justice. Be open to self growth-- growth mindset.

3. Your story is powerful- tell it. Everyone has a story -- listen to them. Respect and celebrate differences. Recognize that peoples’ stories are more complex than ever before (at Earlham, where I go to school, I often meet people who have lived in more countries than they can count on one hand- this is only the beginning of the complexity).

4. Love often.

"Hate begets hate; violence begets violence; toughness begets a greater toughness. We must meet the forces of hate with the power of love." ~ Martin Luther King Jr.

Any change you believe in, starts with you.

Additional Resources

Click here to watch The Royal Society's animation on Unconscious Bias.

Click here to watch a clip from The Freedom Writer's Diary, that demonstrates the power of stories.

Click here to take the Implicit Association Test (IAT)