“This job,” he said, “has taught me that our presumptions about people are rarely true. We have so many preconceptions, especially about foreigners, but they are nothing more than fear of the unknown. We quite comfortably make sweeping generalisations about entire nations of people. These people we suspect of being evil, most are just students and deadbeat dreamers and artists and teachers and greedy businessmen – the same characters that populate all societies. And then some of them, a tiny portion of them, are actually individuals with intent to harm others. But we foolishly judge them all by the few who are bad.”
http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20160210-the-man-who-could-stop-planes
If only a few are bad, why do we make houses with locks on the doors and windows? Why do women carry mace in their purses? Why do we need to have passports to travel between countries? Aren't we foolishly assuming something bad?
ReplyDeleteIan Rawlings Well that is truly bizarre. First time I've seen a site fail because I turned Hola on...
ReplyDeleteFantastic article!
ReplyDeleteWe don't usually lock our houses (or even carry mace) specifically to deal with foreigners. Both activities require close to zero effort and have no ill effects in the overwhelming majority of cases where they aren't needed. So it doesn't make any sense not to lock your door at night.
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