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Comment by roninb | Hacker News Reader

I have had the same self reflection wondering what I was saying or doing when someone is intimidated (for lack of a more polite phrase) by the color of my skin. A woman I currently work with is startled Everytime she sees me and rushes away and I found myself making excuses for her. Trying to reason about why she should obviously be afraid of a 5'10, 170lbs, 23 year old who talks like he's a valley girl...

I wonder whether this is a generational thing or if xenophobia is simply inherent in us as a people.

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I tend to believe it's more inherent than generational. It's been around all throughout the course of history in some form or another. My armchair rationalization is that humans are social creatures and form these groups (where outsiders are to be feared) and skin color is one of the easiest "group identifiers" to latch onto :/

I don't think it's something inherent that we can't (as a species) consciously overcome. I have never heard of such justification before now, and I think having it written out emphasizes really well how ridiculous these xenophobic reactions are.

Different cultures have different reactions to other humans that are outside of the group. Some take aggressive stances, others practice a more welcoming approach.

The Sentinelese people react violently to outsiders, but many (maybe even most) first contacts of Europeans with various natives was peaceful on the part of the locals.

There's enough variation even in just the modern world that I'd feel comfortable saying that aggressive responses to strangers/outsiders is not inherent but a feature of some cultures.

Why it's in some cultures and not others is probably a very complex topic worth investigation.

You are both in agreement it seems. Individuals could be predisposed to xenophobia and racism but external social structures and cultural forces could overcome those predispositions in some circumstances.

"Different cultures have different reactions to other humans that are outside of the group."

Compare speaking rudimentary French in France to speaking rudimentary Spanish in Colombia.

> The Sentinelese people react violently to outsiders, but many (maybe even most) first contacts of Europeans with various natives was peaceful on the part of the locals.

I think it's sort of telling what the evolutionary stance is on being peaceful and welcoming. Look what happened to the natives as a result. In fact being unwelcoming and aggressive can be seen as a show of strength, which is evolutionary advantageous.

If you saw a person that looked significantly different from you and your tribe in the ancient world, they were likely to be one of:

- A foreign soldier that plans to kill or conquer you and everyone you know

- A traveling merchant that you might be able to get along with, but need to be wary of in case he tries to swindle you

- A wanderer that does not pose an existential threat but still cannot be trusted not to steal from you or kidnap your women and children

- Or you could be any of the above to someone else who is going to fight back kicking and screaming

Innate xenophobia is makes perfect sense within this context. Frankly it would be weird if we didn't feel it. The really troubling thing about it to me is that people don't want to accept it as a fact of life and figure out healthy ways to deal with it because it conflicts with their political ideologies.

So why do we continue to act this way today?

Is it cultural? If so then why haven't we overcome it.

I can say it cannot be baked into our genes, because of the timespan it takes for such a thing to occur. The last time humanity had any real genetic shifts, were when the population was small enough that (to a modern day observer) everyone would look like they were of the same race.

Your reaction is extremely human and social, nothing to worry about I'd say. Xenophobia is inherent to being human as well I'm afraid, we're very good at the us against them game, and very good at de-humanizing entire populations. It's just a convenient character trait when you're out, waging war against the bad guys.

Its really f'ed up to think that the reason why we think that way might be the reason why our ancestors were able to survive and propagate.

Luckily, we do have the unique human gifts of reflection, empathy and critical thinking. So while we may be genetically indisposed towards racism, we can still choose to act differently.

Its her problem, not yours, nor should you expend any emotional energy about this stuff.

That might make sense if it were isolated, but this is a covert aggression that one adds to a heap of daily transgressions that are similar. You can't avoid spending emotional energy on it: the unconscious mind has already integrated the behavior and reacts to it, forcing you to deal with the emotional response.

> I wonder whether this is a generational thing or if xenophobia is simply inherent in us as a people.

A certain degree is probably inherent, but a big part of it is cultural (and the cultural component probably has all kinds of association -- there's some generational component, but also regional, ethnic, class, and other factors) and some part of it is probably individual experience.

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