On Prejudice

Abstract

According to typical accounts of prejudice, somebody holding a prejudiced belief is epistemically culpable for doing so (Fricker 2007, 36). However, a prejudice is usually also understood as being more than just a prejudgement. A prejudgement only becomes a prejudice if it is retained in the face of “new knowledge… that would unseat it” (Allport 1954, 9; see also Fricker 2007, 33-4). In his recent book, Prejudice, Endre Begby as argued that the standard view of prejudice just outlined is false (Begby 2023a, 5). According to Bebgy the ordinary way of thinking about prejudice equivocates between an extensional characterisation of prejudice (defining it through prototypical exemplars) and an intensional one (defining prejudice in terms of characteristic errors of reasoning) (Begby 2021, 61-2) and these two ways of characterising prejudice are in tension with one another. If we characterise prejudice in extensional terms then we find that somebody can be perfectly justified in holding a prejudiced belief (Begby 2021, 76). Moreover, they might be justified in retaining their prejudiced belief when presented with contrary evidence after they have acquired their belief (Begby 2021, 77-94). In this paper, I will argue that although it is true that classic accounts of prejudice sometimes illuminate the notion by presenting examples of beliefs without saying anything about how they were acquired or maintained, the standard account is nonetheless not committed to any inconsistency and is the correct account of prejudice.