A Republican senator said today that he would not be voting in favor of confirming Judge Sonia Sotomayor's appointment to the Supreme Court. His reason: He does not believe that she would be able to set aside her biases and judge solely on the basis of the law. This is one of those times when I'm stuck between believing that this guy knows better but is simply kissing up to his ignorant constituency or that he is as dumb as he seems. Does he really believe that only Hispanics, Blacks, gays, and Jews have biases. This is the ignorance of the dominant class. In their world view they have no biases; what they see and what they believe is simply the way things REALLY are.
From Seeing Systems,
The Dominants' culture is invisible to them;
it is the water in which they swim,
the air they breathe.
To the Dominants,
how they speak is the way one speaks,
how they dress is the way one dresses,
their values are the values,
their history is the history.
To the Dominants,
the culture of the Other is not merely different,
it is wrong -
wrong speech,
wrong dress,
wrong emotionality,
wrong spirituality,
wrong values.
The culture of the Others is seen as strange,
sometimes comical,
usually lesser,
inferior.
For more, see "The Challenge of Robust Systems" in Seeing Systems: Unlocking the Mysteries of Organizational Life (second edition)
Barry Oshry
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