Allport saw intergroup hostility as politically innocent and irrational

Evidence

In a later chapter, Allport (p. 265) illustrated his thesis with a homily: “See that man over there? Yes. Well, I hate him. But you don’t know him. That’s why I hate him.” Intergroup hostility had no rational basis: it bubbled forth naively from ignorant and misguided individuals to be inflicted unilaterally and without artifice on subordinate victims. The more intense the hostility, the more extreme the negative behavioral manifestations. It would thus be easy to observe, and the ignorance on which it was founded was regrettable but subject to correction. — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 639

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the contrast later scholars drew — that Allport downplayed the political and systemic functions of prejudice, a critique echoed in recent whiteness and structural-racism literature.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 639