In this case, for example, if someone feels that their race is inadequate than they tend to try to make their race feel better to them by this conceptual way of thinking called reification. This is when the person will look at other races scornfully in order to have a sense of security towards their own race. This can also occur with issues such as gender. A woman may feel that the cause of her lack of success is solely based on the fact that she is female. If this is the case, she may start to develop a prejudice towards men because it may make her feel better about herself. This is also a case of willing the unwilliable which will be discussed later. Reification is the root of most prejudice and the book in Unit 6 describes the source of prejudice may come from the expression of who we are and we think that this will gain us social acceptance. Also it might fight against self anxiety that arises from inner conflict or insecurity. The book also mentions that prejudice may come from the idea that it might promote self interest because people support what brings them pleasure and what does not. The ultimate root of prejudice however, the book states is to defend our social position and self-esteem. These are all aspects of reification and in a sense define reification, i.e. obtaining self-esteem and social position, fighting inner conflict and insecurities. If one feels jealousy towards another, hatred may be formed from this jealousy. For example, if you love to play basketball and your opponent is far better than you, one may feel hatred towards his opponent. One may say that because your opponent is better than that is why you hate them. One may also reify an entire group by putting themselves or their race above another. This is an example of ethnocentrism. Ethnocentrism is the belief that your race is better than all others and this is caused by reification because at one point a culture felt insecure or disgust with their collective "self" or identity and needed to put down other cultures in order to make their culture have this false sense of security.
