Absolutely. The term "racist", in my understanding, means one has a negative prejudice based on a race. I will elaborate slightly.
The brain stores tons of information. In order to make retrieval of information as easy as possible, it stores info with other relevant info in "schemas". Schemas can be thought of like filing cabinets. Within each schema can fall two types of information. There is the information one is very familiar with and knows the details of. There is also info that one does not know many details on, and this type of information is called a "stereotype". Stereotypes are a natural part of our thought processes. Prejudices are simply a positive or negative association made about a person based solely on a characteristic and not through knowing the person. This is also perfectly normal. Discrimination is actions towards a person based solely on a characteristic instead of their personality, and that is what is "wrong", since we can control our actions.
It is a fact that people are most familiar and comfortable with the race they are raised around. This means if they are not reared around our own race, we will not be as comfortable with our own race.
Furthermore, it is possible to have friends of a race that one is racist towards. Because stereotypes, prejudices, and discrimination work based on defining someone by the characteristic of race, if someone befriends some and gets to know that individual, the information on the individual is different from the stereotypes one has about the overall race. That racist individual will view that person as an except to the stereotype, since he has more information on his friend than he does on the majority of members of his target race.
Therefore, it is perfectly possible for one to have racist inclinations or beliefs against ones own race, and even possibly to believe ones self to be the except to them.
The brain stores tons of information. In order to make retrieval of information as easy as possible, it stores info with other relevant info in "schemas". Schemas can be thought of like filing cabinets. Within each schema can fall two types of information. There is the information one is very familiar with and knows the details of. There is also info that one does not know many details on, and this type of information is called a "stereotype". Stereotypes are a natural part of our thought processes. Prejudices are simply a positive or negative association made about a person based solely on a characteristic and not through knowing the person. This is also perfectly normal. Discrimination is actions towards a person based solely on a characteristic instead of their personality, and that is what is "wrong", since we can control our actions.
It is a fact that people are most familiar and comfortable with the race they are raised around. This means if they are not reared around our own race, we will not be as comfortable with our own race.
Furthermore, it is possible to have friends of a race that one is racist towards. Because stereotypes, prejudices, and discrimination work based on defining someone by the characteristic of race, if someone befriends some and gets to know that individual, the information on the individual is different from the stereotypes one has about the overall race. That racist individual will view that person as an except to the stereotype, since he has more information on his friend than he does on the majority of members of his target race.
Therefore, it is perfectly possible for one to have racist inclinations or beliefs against ones own race, and even possibly to believe ones self to be the except to them.
