Deconstructing the Pyramid of Prejudice

Every teacher has heard them, often several times a day: comments that rub them the wrong way but seem too innocent to challenge. “Boys will be boys,” Mr. Shubert says in response to a playground tussle. After Ernie gets 99% on the math quiz, Jamie blurts, “Figures; he’s Chinese.” “That’s so gay,” Tricia moans when her teacher assigns tough homework.  Teachers who want to help students become competent, caring adults cannot just help Ernie learn math. They need to help Mr. Shubert, Jamie, and Tricia see the harm in their seemingly innocuous comments.

While subdued forms of everyday prejudice may seem harmless, appearances can be deceiving. Such commonplace prejudices form the foundation upon which more extreme acts of prejudice build. And they also leave us vulnerable to costly errors of judgment that can have tragic consequences. That is why addressing prejudice in the classroom is as crucial to our youth’s education as learning to read.

Comprehending the pyramid principle of prejudice and its profound educational implications is the first step toward reducing the violence, discrimination, hatred, and bigotry that spread like wildfires in the dry climate created by everyday prejudice. Before we explain the pyramid principle, though, let’s take a quick scan of the psychology of prejudice and how it relates to discrimination and the “-isms.”