Are YOU Prejudiced? (I'll bet you ARE...)

I don't know how many times I've heard people say, "I don't have a prejudiced bone in my body" or "I'm not prejudiced", but most likely, you ARE prejudiced, whether you want to be or not.

The definition of prejudice is "Pre-Judging" someone or something BEFORE you know the facts. Just like anyone else, if I'm walking down a deserted street on a dark night and see someone coming towards me, my senses go on alert and I automatically "get ready" to do whatever I might have to do to protect myself.

If the person turns out to be a six foot four HUGE black person (or brown, yellow, green or white) I'm going to go on "full alert" and try to be ready for anything that might happen.

Of course for all I know, this "Giant" may be a teddy bear and be more afraid of me than I am of him, but since there is no way to know - I'm gonna be ready. What's kind of a shame, is that while the "Giant" may be as gentle as anyone could be, the next person walking down the road may be an eighty pound 13 year old girl who looks as timid as a rabbit, but could in reality be someone with a 12 inch knife out looking for trouble.

We've been taught that "prejudice" is a bad, evil thing, but there are always two sides to every coin and it may be that a little prejudice could some day save your life...