Discrimination and the Family

How Discrimination/Prejudice Affects Families Discrimination and prejudice can have a generational impact on families and family members. I believe that a person can experience discrimination and prejudice in many different ways during their lifetime and that these experiences can produce this generational affect – how they see themselves or their family being treated, comments or behaviors exhibited by their family and their family’s culture towards themselves and others, how the media models any particular ethnic group, religion, political party, etc. In her article, “Getting Past Ideology For Effective Teaching,” Liz Grauerholz lists cultural ideologies that students bring into a classroom. She states, “they almost certainly have internalized some of these dominant cultural messages (Bonilla-Silva and Forman, 2000)” (Grauerholz, 2007). Some of these internalized prejudices include colorblind racism, simple moral dichotomies, biological differences dictate behavior and hard work pays off (Grauerholz, 2007). These learned beliefs and behaviors impact the family dynamic, how children perform in school, friendships, work choices, parenting styles and more.
Specific Example of Discrimination & How It Influences Parenting & Child Rearing In the video, Beyond the Blue: Life as a Female Police Officer, the officer’s husband comments that police officers, in general, carry a certain attitude that they are right and those that they encounter while on the job are wrong. He follows up by stating that it is important that this attitude be turned off at home as it doesn’t work very well in personal space and time. (Beyond the Blue: Life as a Female Police Officer). As the ex-wife of a now retired DPS detective with over 20-years experience on the force, this opinion resonated with me at a core level. As a police officer who worked the graveyard shift for 12-years before getting promoted to narcotics detective, my ex-husband shared with me and others

Cited: Banks, R. Richard (2002). Beyond Profiling: Race, Policing and the Drug War. Stanford Law Review, vol. 56 (572-603). Retrieved from http://escholarship.org/uc/item/7972x29z Beyond the Blue: Life as a Female Police Officer. Films Media Group Grauerholz, Liz (2007). Getting past ideology for effective teaching. Sociological Viewpoints, October 1, 2007. Retrieved from http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P3-1639680721.html Trask, B. S., & Hamon, R. R. (Eds.). (2007). Cultural Diversity and Families, expanding perspectives. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, Inc.