Diversity in the Workplace - Other Types

Everyday people face struggles and most of those struggles are from diversity, prejudice, stereotypes, and discrimination. What are all of these things, and what makes them different from one another?

Prejudice is a prejudgment, which is judging someone or something for his or her race, social class, gender, age, disability, size in weight, sexual orientation, or anything else along those lines.

Stereotype is a belief towards specific groups or individuals. It is when you assume something before you even got to know the person. For example, you see a person who has lots of tattoos, drives a motorcycle, and walks around with a neutral emotion, you might think that this person could be very mean or you might just hang onto your purse a little harder. However, you never know how a person is, but because you are judging a person before you get to know them, you might never know that they could be a sweet, teddy bear, that has a bunch of tattoos, drives a motorcycle, and just walks around with a neutral emotion.

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Discrimination is prejudging people based on their association with a certain group, race, or classification. Discrimination is having strong feelings against those certain groups. It can include rejecting those people from opportunities based on who they are and what they do. Discrimination is everywhere, can make things in the workplace very difficult, and can cause a lot of drama.

What makes prejudice, stereotype, and discrimination different from diversity? There isn’t a huge difference between them, they are all prejudging people by the way they look, the group they are in or just the individual themselves. Why do we judge people before we know them? It’s hard to say because people do it all the time, but the most common saying is “don’t judge a book by its cover,” and I think a lot more people should live by that saying.

Clarence Goodlein, A. P. (2012, October 9). Cultural Diversity & Bias, Prejudice, & Discrimination. Retrieved from http://www.slideshare.net/cgoodlein/macomb-community-college-diversity-presentation-2012

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