High School drama #2: Personal pride in ethnicity and race

in #philosophy7 years ago

I remember in the first or second year of secondary school (at around age 13/14), there was a classmate who said that Whites were more intelligent than Asians.

This asshole did it publicly in our geography class, and later on he said the same thing to my face as if it would make him superior to me. I felt quite embarrassed, but at the same time I also thought of him as morally inferior, because I couldn't see why people would find personal pride in their ethnicity or race.

What always mattered more to me is personal traits and achievements. What did this guy achieve? At the time he, although having been born in Holland and having had no language or cultural barriers to overcome, failed his first year and had to repeat classes.

Then there was this girl who liked him. Although he was a bully to me, and this girl knew of his asshole attitude, she still liked him. I thought of her as morally distorted, because I couldn't see how you could like someone who would enjoy hurting other people with no good reasons at all.


If you enjoy reading this article, please consider following me. I mainly write about philosophy, economics, and my travels.

Follow me @chhaylin
E-mail: [email protected]
Wordpress: www.chhaylinlim.wordpress.com
Sort:  

i can see many people are extremely intelligents. So it's not what your race. we are all humans. :-)

Yup... there are intelligent people among any group :)

Too bad Asians in my opinion seems to be smarter most of the time.
From what I see they put in drastically more effort as they have a desire to succeed as well as some are put under immense pressures.

Moral consistency is important. If you are not moral consistent, why should others be consistent towards you?