Prejudice synonyms:
ageism, animosity , antipathy , apartheid, aversion , bad opinion, bias , bigotry , chauvinism, contemptuousness, detriment , discrimination , disgust , dislike , displeasure, disrelish, enmity , foregone conclusion, illiberality, injustice , jaundiced eye, mindset , misjudgment, narrow-mindedness, one-sidedness, partiality, pique , preconceived notion, preconception, prejudgment, prepossession, racism , repugnance , revulsion , sexism, slant , spleen, tilt, twist , umbrage , unfairness, warp, xenophobi
I would add "sin" to that list.
Seems to me that we cannot rid ourselves of prejudice. We simply shuffle it around to attempt to not have to deal with it.
History seems to shows us that to rise above prejudices we must use greater prejudice.
For instance, in order for African-Americans to have gained fair treatment, a movement was made to bring light to the unsavory behavior of the people perpetuating unfair treatment. This effectively allowed us to shift prejudice onto the bigots although the spirit of bigotry never went anywhere. Now, people who speak of anything with a racial subject, must do so carefully as to not become the subject of prejudice themselves.
In the Watchtower, the movement is currently to make worldy, disfellowshipped, and disassociated people into unsavory characters. Being out, some former Witnesses have prejudices against organized religion, religious belief, believers, or just simply uptight individuals.
By far love is the only thing that can eliminate prejudice. What we find in history is that love is not behind much of the changes toward certain mindsets but its a shifting of prejudices from one class to another.
I have always advocated love as the best solution but I'm starting to see it is truly hard to apply. Because most times you may apply the love while the other person may never see your point or understand what the hell your doing. All the while treating you with contempt.
The natural reaction is to return contempt for contempt. Of course, Jesus didn't advocate that. So what to do?
If we rely on ourselves, we may decide to keep our prejudices few and quietly tucked away at home where the public can't get to them.
If we rely on some of Jesus points then we have the additional option to use love in the face of what ever prejudice brings our way with extra benefit of eliminating the prejudices in our own hearts.
This is one of the first posts I kinda let loose on...
I apologize if its not relevant. I was just thinking about it and wanted to get it out.
Off my soapbox!
DJP
