Sexism challenges defining prejudice as antipathy

Evidence

Although the Allportian approach to sexism has been fruitful, the limitations of treating sexism purely as antipathy toward women are twofold. First, it does not take into account the fact that people often hold positive attitudes toward and beliefs about women. Second, it does not explain why women themselves are prone to maintaining the status quo. … Thus, implicit measures provide unique insights into the psychology of prejudice beyond the direct, explicit measures that were the tools of social psychology when The Nature of Prejudice was written. — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 758

Allport’s (1954/1979) discussion focused on ethnic and religious prejudice, primarily racism and anti-Semitism. Antipathy toward a group as a whole (and its individual members) thus formed the core of Allport’s definition of prejudice. In contrast, he ignored (with one brief exception, pp. 33–4) a prejudice that targets about half the population, namely sexism, whose nature poses a critical challenge to defining prejudice as an antipathy. — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 176

Categorization

• XREF: Parallels Stanley Milgram’s and later work on complicity; also echoes the ‘victims uphold the hierarchy’ theme in peace/conflict studies.
• QUESTION: Worth chasing: the IAT methods described here (response latency) are contested — how do present critiques of IAT validity bear on the continuation?
• corroborated: 5 independent passages support this claim — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 758; , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 176