Do You Prefer White People or Black People? – Implicit Association Test

September 11, 2009

I have been reading Blink, a book by Malcolm Gladwell where he speaks about rapid cognition: our ability to make snap judgments, our subconscious responses to the world, and so on. I would recommend it to anyone who is interested in the topic of how our human behavior is fueled by our subconscious thought, and often quick verdicts we make without even knowing it.

In the book Gladwell mentions the Implicit Association Test (IAT), where you can take a test and rate your subconscious preference to many different things or groupings of people. Gladwell himself spoke about his personal shock when he took the Race IAT because his results, time and time again, showed that he had a “strong automatic preference to white people over black people”. What makes this even more humorous, yet troubling to him, is Malcolm Gladwell is half black and half white; however his test results still showed he “preferred white people over black”.

The test really taps into the subconscious and if you take it honestly, you cannot fool it and hide your prejudice. There are many factors that impact on the results; your level and quality of interaction with black and white people, your upbringing, the way you have been socialized to think about black and white people, portrayal of black and white people in the media, just to name a few. I was very curious, so I took the Race IAT myself. I expected to see I was a closet racist or something. I nervously took the test and received my result:

Your Result

Your data suggest a moderate automatic preference for African American compared to European American.

I fall within 4% of people who have taken that test. I was rather relieved. Take the test for yourself! It is very interesting! Post your results on here! Don’t be shy or ashamed. Let’s start a discussion about it!

 racebreakdown

To take the test:

Go to https://implicit.harvard.edu/

Click on “Demonstration”

Click on “Go to the Demonstration Tests”

Click on “I wish to proceed”

Click on the IAT test you wish to take. I took the Race IAT

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Posted by capetownbrown

Is it inappropriate to laugh?

September 11, 2009

Every single time I drive past the place where I got hit by a car I laugh. Seriously! E V E R Y    S I N G L E    T I M E ! Sometimes it’s a loud explosion of laughter, and other times its silent chuckles in my head. But oh yes, when I see that corner, it never fails and I laugh!

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NICE Emerging Sounds

September 9, 2009

I went to the Emerging Sounds Battle of the Bands tonight. NICE played first. I am now even more impressed than I was before. They are in a league of their own. This young band, dressed like straight laced Harvard students, proved to be musically talented and mature beyond their years, delivering a solid performance. 

I belive they are performing with Hey Mister at Catu on 26 September. Make sure to check them out!

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Robbing the Nameless – A Story of Homelessness

September 9, 2009

I was sound asleep. By that point I had gotten used to the thin layer of cardboard serving as a mattress in between my sore body and the cold concrete. My closed sleeping eyes had grown accustomed to the street lights that never go out, illuminating us street dwellers as we slept. My response to the rats crawling all over me in my sleep, inspecting, sniffing, burrowing in my pants, had become more subconscious, as I had learned to kick them off without fully waking. The sounds of the city played as a lullaby, gently serenading me deeper into wonderful REM sleep, instead of keeping me awake. At that point, there was very little that could wake me.

I felt my back pack, doubling as my pillow, shift beneath my head. It moved out from under my head, simultaneously to the sound of the front zipper of the bag screaming a warning that the bag is being invaded. That was enough to drag me out of La La Land. I quickly popped my head out from under the blanket. A large, dark silhouette of a person stood over me, holding my bag. My eyes began to adjust to the bright street light.

“Wat maak jy?!” my raspy voice pierced the night air.

Pila stood over me in shock; embarrassed, confused, exposed, and remorseful. He quickly pushed the bag back beside my head. The tone of his voice showed bewilderment and repentance,

“Ryan?! I didn’t know it was you!”

You see, Pila had just gotten out of jail that afternoon. He was not aware that I was spending the 16 Days of Activism sleeping on the streets, and even less aware that I was spending it in the area where he sleeps, and apparently steals from other sleeping street people. As a matter of fact, I was probably the last person he expected to see under that blanket. But that brief, late night interaction with Pila taught me quite a number of lessons; and more deep and impacting lessons, than the obvious one that there is not this magical camaraderie which stops people living on the streets from stealing from each other, therefore forcing them to turn all their attention to the general public.

I learned a lesson about humanity. I realized the dark evil and injustice we allow ourselves to get up to when we see others as nameless, anonymous figures, rather than personal, individual people with names, characteristics, and qualities we grow to know and love. When Pila first approached me that night, he merely saw my blanket covered figure, namelessly lying on a bag, the bag being his next means to his next end. It was easy for him to violate and steal from the unidentified shape. But as soon as my face was exposed, and the anonymous form was given a name, it made the sinister act Pila was committing much more difficult for him.

I had known Pila for the past nine years. He had gotten to know me, appreciate me, respect me, and even a like me; a like possibly bordering a love that a brother would have for another brother. And I for him. Pila knew the dark, blanket covered figures were his friends, comrades, family, and brothers, but seeing them only as dark, blanket covered figures made it easier to take from them. Once the figure is given a name, the task becomes difficult, if not impossible.

Most crimes committed are those of the anonymous nature. And as I sit here at my computer and type, and you sit at yours and read, we may sit with a certain self righteousness, thinking we are somehow better than “those” that go out and steal from others, and even steal from us. Meanwhile, though we may have never robbed someone of their cell phone, gold chain, car or other belongings, we are also perpetrators of crimes against a nameless humanity.

Because, like Pila did with my blanket covered figure, we also allow others  to remain nameless shapes, so our shady acts towards them do not sting so much; sting, not to them, but to us. Keeping people in anonymity is self protection. We do it with whole groupings of people; people we feel are “beneath us” for whatever reason. We pass them up, glare at them, speak down at them, hold back our humanness, and don’t allow ourselves to see theirs. We keep them anonymous because it is easier to treat a nameless person that way.

We may not steal their stuff, but we rob them. We rob them of dignity, basic human interaction, kindness, love, respect, and contact. We treat them bad, and they may treat us bad in return, which we feel then further justifies our treatment of them. And we can continue on, robbing the nameless figures of our lives, like Pila did, or we can uncover their blanket covered heads, get to know them, and they us, leading to a better quality of interaction for both parties. I know how I want to live, and I am thankful to Pila for the lesson and reminder.

originally posted on Moral Fibre

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Posted by capetownbrown

Blind Leading the Blind: Leadership Skills from a Horse

September 9, 2009

I can’t emphasize more how amazing it has been to be a part of these Equine Sessions with this group of young guys for the past month! It is truly amazing to see the lessons that can be learned during these horse lead exercises. Yesterday was no different! During the session I had way too many thoughts and revelations to share, so I am going to try and sum up some of my main ideas. But this is going to be a long one!

Before we arrived the facilitators set up three identical obstacle courses, running parallel down the main part of the arena. As soon as we arrived and the guys saw this, they could tell they were in for a challenging session. They were split up into pairs and then given instructions: one person would be blind folded and was in charge of leading the horse through the obstacle course by its bridle, the other person of the pair, not blind folded, was responsible to lead the blind folded person through the obstacle course. The non-blind folded person was not allowed to touch the blind folded person or the horse; he had to merely given verbal instructions, or any other creative form of communication without physical contact with the blind person or the horse.

So, even if the horse was freaking out and pulling the poor blind folded person off the course, the leader was only allowed to give verbal instructions. The guys stepped right up to the challenge and were seriously engaged form the beginning. I began seeing different metaphors in the different aspects and learnings of the exercise. I saw:

The obstacle course as Life itself.

The blind folded person as an Individual just going through life.

The horse as Life’s Events.

And the person leading as Leadership and authority figures in our life.

It is actually incredible to be aware of these factors and see how they impact one another. For instance…

The Individual may feel that they have studied Life closely and know it, but while walking through it, Life’s Events can come and cause a disturbance, distracting, disorienting and causing chaos for the Individual.

If the Individual does not trust Leadership there are negative ramifications, whilst if the Leadership is insecure, or a bad communicator, the Individual going through Life is more vulnerable and in danger to Life’s Events.

To complicate matters, Life’s Events are totally out of the Individual and the Leadership’s control. Sometimes Life’s Events are wild, unruly, nibble at the Individual, and end up dragging the Individual through Life, banging him into the different obstacles, whilst sometimes Life’s Events are calm and manageable. For an onlooker it is obvious to see who is being dragged along by Life’s Events and who has control over them.

Observing these exercises and also knowing the participants well is also amazing because their strengths and weaknesses become so clear in the arena. For example,

The one young man, who is very strong willed and has control issues, was interesting to watch as Leadership and as the Individual. When he was the Individual he was also was “lucky enough” to get challenging Life Events (the large, unruly white horse), which made it even more difficult for him to trust Leadership. The Individual took off his blind fold at least six times during the course of Life. He was scared of Life’s Events but instead of listening to and trusting Leadership, he removed his blind fold for full control. But then when he switched to being Leadership, when the Individual was perceived to not be listening properly, or Life’s Events began to get challenging he would break the rules and grab hold of the Individual or Life’s Events, trying to physically manipulate them.

Or another young man, who has serious trust issues, sped through Life with his partner with no real problems when he was the Individual. In the feedback time when he was asked how they did it so quickly, his answer reflected his reliance on self and not on Leadership. The Individual said he had studied Life and had every obstacle pictured in his mind. He made sure he had control over Life’s Events and even though he was blind to what was to come, he trusted his imagination of what he had already studied of Life to successfully get him through. He said it’s all about studying it and knowing what is to come and mathematics. When asked what he would do in a situation where he was completely blind to Life, not having been able to get a glimpse of what is to come, he paused and hesitantly responded, “I guess I would have to trust the leader?”

Or the other pair, with one older, more secure individual, and a younger, more insecure individual. Funny enough, when the younger guy was the Individual and the older was Leadership, even though Leadership’s communication was not clear at all times, there was an obvious bond and complete trust from the Individual, and this got them successfully through Life with no hassles. But when the younger guy was Leadership, with not much experience in being authority, he apprehensively led the Individual, not giving clear directions, and appearing obviously worried and frazzled at times. At one point Life’s Events pulled the Individual off the path of Life and Leadership was in way over his head. He could not muster up the words to even help the Individual. Life’s Events ended up pulling the Individual very far off the path and knocked him into a pole.

This pair was later given a second chance to be in the same position. I think about times when I have put my trust in leadership and have been hurt by them. I am not quick to trust again. I also think of times when I have been in leadership and, do to things which were out of my hands, people that I was responsible for got hurt. It is equally not easy to want to step back up in leadership again. Sometimes life’s events just happen and we are not equipped to deal with them as leaders or followers. When the pair got a second chance they truly amazed me. The Individual put his trust back in Leadership and did not hold back. Leadership, even though he was inexperienced and had made a serious blunder which allowed the Individual to get injured, focused and stepped up to the challenge. The second time around they succeeded.

That exercise taught me a lot about what it takes to be a good leader but also what it takes to be a good follower. There has to be a certain amount of trust in authority, but authority has to have the best interests of the individuals in mind. Life’s events happen and are spontaneous, but it is possible to deal with them in a way in which we have control. I saw that in action when one of the guys got the white horse (who everyone had been struggling with) and he calmly, confidently, took control even though he was blind to the obstacles of Life and was being lead himself. Are we in control of life’s events or do they just drag us through life as victims of the circumstances. How trusting are we of those that are in authority over us? How trustworthy are we as leaders?

It was a powerfully revealing session for me!

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Posted by capetownbrown

Practice what you preach…

September 8, 2009

This morning I got invited to an event on Facebook to “walk out and pray” during President Obama’s address to American youth. My mom, a teacher, told me that people have made such a fuss about Obama’s address to American children, shown during school hours, that they actually have to send permission slips home to allow the children to watch it; a presidential address. I have also seen many people complaining about Obama’s policies, bad  mouthing him, and generally just not being very supportive through Facebook statuses, videos, notes, groups and so on.

I want to respond to that by saying I feel that is why America is such a good country. People are truly allowed to live out freedom of speech and freedom of belief! And now, these people are obviously exercising those freedoms.

I am troubled by a specific aspect of this however. I was not a Bush supporter, from the beginning. I had many conservative Christians try and coax me over to “their side”, convince me that “any good Christian” would vote for Bush and support him, and even try and say that I was not a Christian if I did not support him. Then, most of them, would use a line from the Bible saying that “God puts leaders in place” and that I must support that leader no matter what.

I did not agree with that at the time because I cannot rationalize leaders like Hitler and Mugabe in the light of that belief. I was happy to agree to disagree. But people were very insistent that I must follow that belief of theirs. Now I am confused. Because that same group of people, speaking generally now which I know is dangerous, is the same group of people who I see showing everything but support for Obama.

It would seem, if those people truly believed and lived out what they spoke to me about, regarding my feelings of Bush, they would be the leaders of encouraging people to show support for Obama. But it is not so. And I find it irritating to say the least. I am not saying you have to like Obama or dislike Bush. I am just saying I believe we should practice what we preach, all the time. Or simply don’t preach.

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Sometimes a guy just needs a pair of shades!

September 6, 2009

It’s so easy to feel like a rock star with the right pair of shades on! And when I say “right” I don’t necessarily mean sunglasses that other people think look good on you. When I say “right” I mean, a nice pair of sunglasses that you feel good wearing. The kind that make you look cooler, to yourself, when you are driving down the street singing one of your favorite songs, looking in the rear view mirror which doubles as a television screen playing MTV or VH1. Other people look at you as “that guy who thinks he’s cool”, but you don’t care. You are in the music video for that song, and those sunglasses are an essential part of your wardrobe.

Thank you, thank you very much!

Thank you, thank you very much!

Most of my life I have not been a sunglasses person; and yes, I do believe you get sunglasses people. A sunglasses person is someone who can pretty much put on any pair of sunglasses and look totally cool in them, and not just to themselves. I repeat, I am not one of those people. I guess I just have a funny shaped face or something. But recently I have started wearing sunglasses pretty much on a daily basis. At first it was out of necessity because the South African sun has given my eyes a beat down over the years and I can barely open my eyes outside on a really sunny day. But after a while I just began to enjoy wearing them.

And because I am not a sunglasses person, and pretty much any pair I buy looks pretty dumb on me, I just stopped caring. This was a liberating experience because, much like a sunglasses person, I can wear any pair of sunglasses and feel free. I may not look as cool as the sunglasses person, who can pull off any pair, but I feel just as free, and that’s all that really maters in my book. For instance, I have one pair that I call my “Jewish business man’s glasses” because they look exactly like that, those big, blocky glasses you see Jewish business men on movies wearing.

They look pretty ridiculous on me. Most people think it is funny I wear them. I do to. But I like them for some strange reason. Anyways!

I had this other pair of sunglasses that I liked, but they squeezed my head and gave me a headache. So yesterday I went to this cheap sunglasses store to see if they had the equivalent version in a non-head-squeezing model. And indeed they did. And indeed I bought them. As I was leaving the mall I pulled up to the traffic lights, where some children often beg for money, and I saw a boy (about twelve-years-old or so) a few cars up, asking for something or the other. I motioned for him to come over.

He curiously came up to my car window, expecting me to hand him some money. He seemed a bit more timid than the average kid that begs at a traffic light. I held up the head-squeezers, which looked like they would fit perfectly on his head that was about half the size of my enormous melon,

“You want a pair of sunglasses?”

His eyes lit up. He did not hesitate for a second. He enthusiastically nodded his head yes. I handed him the glasses. He earnestly thanked me, put them on, shook my hand and walked on. The people in the car next to me were full of smiles watching this, probably out of the ordinary, scene. They gave me thumbs up, as though I had just come up with the cure for some incurable disease. The red light turned green. As I drove away I looked at the kid in the rear view mirror. He was strutting down the side walk, shades on, chin held high, chest puffed up, shoulders back, listening to the cheers of the millions of invisible fans.

He was a rock star! It was a beautiful moment.

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Posted by capetownbrown

A cure for that terrible “too much coffee” feeling…

September 4, 2009

It is not even 9:00am and, after two cups of coffee, I already have that gross “too much coffee” sensation, starting in my stomach pushing its way up to my chest and bubbling in my throat. I hate that feeling! It is disgustingly uncomfortable!

Which reminds me of a conversation I had with my buddy Padraic just yesterday.

We were at a coffee shop. I had already finished two cappuccinos, and I had had two cups of filter coffee before I left the house that morning. We were sitting outside and had sat for a while. It was cold out, I was shivering a bit and I wanted to order something warm, but I had that terrible “too much coffee” feeling.

I ordered a hot chocolate; very much out of character for me.

Padraic and I then began to discuss the “too much coffee” feeling and he said he used to get it all the time but never experiences it anymore.

Wow, I thought! He has figured out a cure for this problem that has plagued me all these years! He will share it with me and I will be able to drink hundreds of cups of coffee in one day and I will be unaffected by the sting of coffee. But what was Padraic’s magic trick? Pills, mind power, garlic, herbal remedies, a ten step program, had his body just become immune to the “too much coffee” feeling from a coffee overdose, had he gone to a hypnotist? I was curious to hear his answer.

“HOW?” I asked, as if he was about to reveal to me the meaning of life itself.

“I only drink one cup a day…and never more than that.”

Waah waaah waaaaaaaaaaaaaah. So it wasn’t a magical answer after all; a very simple one at that: self control. Yeah, it may be simple but it is not easy! It just reminded me again how us humans like to complicate things, make situations more difficult than we have to, and cause damage to ourselves, and the earth for that matter, but instead changing the negative behavior causing the damage we try and look for a more easy way around it, so we can continue with our destructive behavior but not have to experience the negative ramifications.

We may never learn. But guys like Padraic have, and give hope for the rest of us. But he is not enough. We will continue on, not listening, and if the world is not burned up by global warming, all the individual coffee drinkers will burn themselves up from the inside out, from drinking unhealthy amounts of coffee on a daily basis and habitually getting the “too much coffee” feeling.

I raise my third cup in the air and toast to us all!

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Posted by capetownbrown

Depp doesn’t watch his own movies…

September 3, 2009

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If you don’t have anything nice to say…

September 2, 2009

I had a really good day today. But it started off a bit strange this morning on the train.

There was this whole group of business people in suits, standing up in the packed train car. And at one point a mentally retarded young man came into the carriage.  He went around and shook everyone’s hands, then he went back around and asked those same people for money, and then he went to another section. For some reason that section was luckier because they got kisses instead of hand shakes.

People reacted in different ways. Some accepted the kisses and hand shakes and others shewed him away, and even swore at him.

The most disturbing part was the group of business people. They stood there and loudly analyzed everything he did, laughing, making fun of him and comparing things he was doing to some sleazy business course they had all apparently attended together. It was gross.

I had many thoughts, and judgements and points I wanted to make about those business people. I sat there thinking of the fiery blog I would write. They really pissed me off. But now, as I sit here, I really don’t have the energy for it.

And I guess, the same thing that i wished for them i will say to myself…

If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.

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Posted by capetownbrown

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