An example that demonstrates this in-group favoritism is shown by one of the White police officers who is outwardly racist and treats African-American people degradingly. In the beginning of the film it shows him pulling over the wealthy African-American director and his wife for no justifiable reason. He ends up sexually harassing the director’s wife and gets away with it. In addition, he completely disrespects and insults an African-American secretary who works at the doctor’s office where his father is being treated. It can be said that he was engaging in blatant racism because his emotional responses to people who did not belong to the White race were strongly negative and could even be considered as hatred. However, in the end, he rescues the director’s African-American wife from a burning car. His actions were unexpected because it seemed like he had so much hatred towards minorities. According to Chryssochoou (2004), the cognitive-motivational perspective explains that people are more likely to be discriminative when they possess feelings of in-group favoritism, not necessarily because they have hatred towards the out-group (p.37). This could explain why this officer mistreated African-American people at first and then decreased his sense of in-group favoritism when he decided to save the
An example that demonstrates this in-group favoritism is shown by one of the White police officers who is outwardly racist and treats African-American people degradingly. In the beginning of the film it shows him pulling over the wealthy African-American director and his wife for no justifiable reason. He ends up sexually harassing the director’s wife and gets away with it. In addition, he completely disrespects and insults an African-American secretary who works at the doctor’s office where his father is being treated. It can be said that he was engaging in blatant racism because his emotional responses to people who did not belong to the White race were strongly negative and could even be considered as hatred. However, in the end, he rescues the director’s African-American wife from a burning car. His actions were unexpected because it seemed like he had so much hatred towards minorities. According to Chryssochoou (2004), the cognitive-motivational perspective explains that people are more likely to be discriminative when they possess feelings of in-group favoritism, not necessarily because they have hatred towards the out-group (p.37). This could explain why this officer mistreated African-American people at first and then decreased his sense of in-group favoritism when he decided to save the