Finding the name for/coining a name for this syndrome

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Humans often take much greater offense at aggression that comes from greater social or cultural distance.

I can call my brother ugly but you can't.
Interracial crime makes it much more polemic. Our race can murder our children, but we'll be dammed if yours can!
Same with crimes by foreigners. Our citizens can rape our women, but we'll be dammed if yours can!

I'm looking for something more specific than, say, "tribalism". If anyone knows a good term that describes this kind of phenomena or can think of a good one please let me know.

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Type: Discussion • Score: 22 • Views: 5,535 • Replies: 38

[+3] - engineer - 01/08/2010I vote for the hyperassociative effect: the willingness to assign benign intentions to those of similar association.

@Robert Gentel,

cultural double standard

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@Robert Gentel,

cultural hypocrisy

am I on the right track here?

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@Robert Gentel,

Yes indeed. Refugees are objectionable & a drain on our resources, apart from that nice Somali family who lives next door to us!
Teachers are incompetent & lazy & have an outrageous number of holidays, paid for by our hard-earned taxes ... apart from my father, who's a really different! He's up every night till late, marking student's work & preparing his lessons. There should be more teachers like him. Wink

Yes, I know what you mean, Robert. Everyone's an expert from a distance.

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@msolga,

Thinking about what this syndrome could be called. Haven't come up with anything yet.

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@husker,

I think they describe it but not in the way I am looking for. It certainly is a double standard/hypocrisy but I want something that relates specifically to how it is so, as this is a much more specific subset of double standards.

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@msolga,

Hmmm. The scenarios you describe seem to involve the separation of people you empathize with versus the nameless people you don't and the lack of their personal narrative was the constant in your examples.

I wonder how well the simple empathy and awareness of narrative translate to a larger scale, like when a crime by foreigners generates more outrage than citizens. Part of it seems to involve an actual concept of enemy at a larger scale.

I almost feel like being crude and calling it the "we can rape our women but you can't" syndrome as that is often the arch-typical example of such outrage where quotidian rape is just a sad footnote to newspapers while a foreigner might cause a war. Where interracial rape causes a lynching and so on...

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@Robert Gentel,

Hypocrism

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homo-xenophobic?

homo (same) xeno (strange, different, intruding) phobic (fearful of the item specified by the suffix)

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[urlhttp://www.bing.com/reference/semhtml/New_tribalists?q=tribalism+cultural+hypocrisy][/url]

one handed atm

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homodimitto = same + forgive (?)

Maybe George could help me out with this.

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@boomerang,

We do need a word to describe this, but we really need one that is not only descriptive, but might find it into the common language.

Not that I am coming up with something I like.

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Have sociologists classified different varieties of xenophobia? Is Robert describing a specific type of xenophobia?

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Bluepotatoism.

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@Robert Gentel,

Robert Gentel wrote:

Humans often take much greater offense at aggression that comes from greater social or cultural distance.

I can call my brother ugly but you can't.

Interracial crime makes it much more polemic. Our race can murder our children, but we'll be dammed if yours can!

Same with crimes by foreigners. Our citizens can rape our women, but we'll be dammed if yours can!

I'm looking for something more specific than, say, "tribalism". If anyone knows a good term that describes this kind of phenomena or can think of a good one please let me know.

It's all just an extended function of Familiarity. It's the same basic behavior that causes family members to treat each other more harshly than visitors.
Familiarity breeds contempt and contempt allows you to rationalize bad behavior.

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@Robert Gentel,

Robert Gentel wrote:

Humans often take much greater offense at aggression that comes from greater social or cultural distance.

I can call my brother ugly but you can't.

Interracial crime makes it much more polemic. Our race can murder our children, but we'll be dammed if yours can!

Same with crimes by foreigners. Our citizens can rape our women, but we'll be dammed if yours can!

I'm looking for something more specific than, say, "tribalism". If anyone knows a good term that describes this kind of phenomena or can think of a good one please let me know.

a variant of zenofobia

Wandel beat me to it.

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@Robert Gentel,

Quote:

I can call my brother ugly but you can't.

Interracial crime makes it much more polemic. Our race can murder our children, but we'll be dammed if yours can!

Same with crimes by foreigners. Our citizens can rape our women, but we'll be dammed if yours can!

'Cultural Relativity' would cover the bases I think. If one's related to or similar to someone in some way, their anger or dismay at the way that person is abused or treated is meted out in measures relative to how closely related they are.

If they're not related - it's less of a problem for them. If they are related - they go through the roof.
If they're not related - defense is uncertain or maybe nonexistent. If they are related - defense is usually immediate.

Maybe adding the word 'Shared' at the beginning would make it clearer. Yeah, I think Shared Cultural Relativity would be more precise and make the meaning clearer and more transparent without need for further explanation.

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The classic case in anthropology got termed "segmentary lineages" after EE Evans-Pritchard's study of the pastoral Nuer of E. Africa. Successively larger social units would put aside their differences and unite, depending on where a threat was coming from. Brouthers would hate and battle each other until cousins affronted them, then they'd unite against the cousins. Cousins would unite against second cousins. All cousins in a lineage would unite against a threat from a different lineage. All the competing lineages in a clan would unite against problems with a different clan. All the warring clans in the Nuer would unite against a threat from the Dinka.
http://www.anthrobase.com/Dic/eng/def/segmentary-lineage.htm

It's kind of a variant of "The enemy of my enemy is my friend" principle, like the hated commie Russians becoming our valiant allies in WWII because they fought the Nazis.

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I was thinking of something like "closed" or 'imploded culturality"

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I like a word starting with xeno and then ending with a word for blaming (working on that part)

I suppose, strangerblame..

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Finding the name for/coining a name for this syndrome

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