Friday, August 17, 2012
Ethnocentrism is under-rated. Most college students are
exposed to the concept only if they take a course in Introductory Sociology or
if they should chose to major in sociology. Even then, the concept of
ethnocentrism is presented as an evil to be extinguished by fostering the value
of anti-ethnocentrism.
For those who are not well-versed in the language of
sociology, ethnocentrism refers to the tendency to judge other cultures by the
standards of one’s own culture. Since this is a natural human tendency, the
task of fostering anti-ethnocentrism is difficult, to say the least. But it is
also self-defeating.
Technically speaking, sociologists form a sub-culture
with their own set of values, beliefs, and practices. And they are the only
sub-culture that is known to promote the value of anti-ethnocentrism.
Therefore, when sociologists tell people of other cultures (non-sociologists)
that it is bad to judge people of other cultures by the values of their own
culture, they are doing just that: judging people of other cultures by the
values of their own culture. In fact, the value they impose on others
(anti-ethnocentrism) cannot be imposed without engaging in ethnocentrism. It is
intellectual Onanism. It produces no fruit.
While anti-ethnocentrism fails the test of internal
consistency, its greatest weakness is external. That is to say, it fails when
applied to real-world problems – problems outside the realm of theory and
abstract sociological jargon. Who can read about the Rape of Nanking or the
Nazi Holocaust and remain convinced that we should somehow refrain from judging
that which is self-evidently wrong?
Today’s college student is just as intellectually capable
as yesterday’s college student. But he (and increasingly she) often suffers
from moral atrophy. We need to combat this atrophy by exercising the natural
moral reflex. It might not require a whole major in Ethnocentric Studies
dedicated to teaching the upside of judging cultures like Nazi Germany. But we
should at least consider a course called Introduction to Ethnocentrism. It
should be a required course within the Department of Sociology so that no one
actually graduates before fully appreciating the necessity of judging other
cultures.
On March 7 of 1996, the day I became a former atheist, I
had the unique experience of interviewing prisoners inside a filthy prison in
Quito, Ecuador. I was appalled by the fact that the prison served rotten meat
to prisoners after boiling it in large vats in order to make it edible. In
fact, I was so appalled by what I saw that I wrote an expose for an academic
human rights journal. In that article, I summarized numerous human rights
abuses. Unfortunately, the editor of the journal was a sociologist who was more
interested in defending the Ecuadorian culture than in defending the
individuals being fed objectively rotten, sub-standard food.
Her name was Michelle Stone, then an Associate Professor
of Sociology at Youngstown State University. She told me she liked the article
and would publish it. Then she changed her mind and made its publication
contingent: I had to remove the portion of the article criticizing the food
given to the prisoners. Her exact words were “It isn’t nice to judge the foods
of cultures other than your own.”
Eventually, Stone stepped down as editor of that journal.
The next editor was forwarded an email from me showing that Stone had gone back
on her word. Because he was a psychology professor, not a sociology professor,
the new editor was able to recognize the absurdity of Stone’s anti-judgmental
judgmentalism. So he over-ruled her and ran the article, which was later read
by a congresswoman from Florida. After reading my article, the congresswoman
flew down to Ecuador to negotiate the release of a woman who was stuck in an
Ecuadorian prison and subjected to inhumane treatment.
It is sad when I reflect on that incident. An article
that helped secure the release of an American woman held prisoner without due
process almost did not see the light of day. And the sole reason for the delay
in publication was that a sociologist had given the war on ethnocentrism
greater priority than the war on human suffering. Unfortunately, this is a
common occurrence in the intellectually and morally confused discipline of
sociology.
Someone needs to teach future sociologists that the
failure to impose judgment results in the failure to remedy injustice. Ironically,
the ones most qualified to enlighten them come from a culture other than their
own.
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