I've recently been reading/watching some videos and writings by Robin Diangelo on systemic racism - here's a great starting point: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7mzj0cVL0Q. She also wrote the book "White Fragility".
Thinking about that, I'm just wondering how different it would be if one of those people who mistook the employee for the CEO instead turned to the CEO and said "I'm sorry, please excuse me for the instance of racism I just perpetrated against you, I promise it won't happen again." I realize how outlandish that may sound writing that out, but I'd propose that the fact that it does sound outlandish is the main problem. Everyone in the US was raised in an environment that inculcated certain racial ideas, subconsciously or not. We can't address them if we're so embarrassed by their existence as to pretend they don't exist.
It can be both.
"Women drive badly" is a sexist stereotype, but not racism.
"Black people drive badly" would be both a stereotype and racism.
A better example would be, "women aren't passionate about driving". That's a stereotype, likely a correct one (i.e. substantiated by statistics... I mean, I'm not certain, but that would be my prior, but I'm very open to changing it), and most importantly: not harmful. It's just a stereotype.
I'm not denying that things could be harmful (racism, sexist, ...). But not all stereotypes are. Like guessing that "Alex" is probably a guy.
Citation on those not being harmful? Stereotypes like that seem to be a driving factor in why STEM fields are very male dominated.
"Girls don't like cars; go find some dolls to play with."
> Everyone knows that testosterone makes young men orders of magnitude more violent
You're using hyperbole but yes it's commonly understood that there's a link between testosterone and aggression, however you extend that claim to something completely different
> why is it inconceivable that they could also be 4 times more interested in more mechanic play? It’s been observed even in almost newborn chimpanzees for Gods sake.
I counter that this second claim is related to the first, is it that testosterone makes young males more likely to play with mechanical objects? There are a few articles that reference this study from 2008 [1]. It refers to rhesus monkeys not chimpanzees and their hypothesis at the end is much more nuanced
>We offer the hypothesis that toy preferences reflect hormonally influenced behavioral and cognitive biases which are sculpted by social processes into the sex differences seen in monkeys and humans.
Furthermore there is at least 1 meta-analysis from 2017 [2] that highlights
> Gender differences in toy choice exist and appear to be the product of both innate and social forces. > Despite methodological variation in the choice and number of toys offered, context of testing, and age of child, the consistency in finding sex differences in children's preferences for toys typed
Note they do not make the claim that testosterone is the cause of these differences. Scientists try to be careful about the language they use, we should be just as careful.
1: Sex differences in rhesus monkey toy preferences parallel those of children - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.yhbeh.2008.03.008
2: Sex differences in children's toy preferences: A systematic review, meta‐regression, and meta‐analysis - https://doi.org/10.1002/icd.2064