ON THE IMPORTANCE OF HOLDING POLITICAL POWER; USING THE WHITE MALE EFFECT CONCEPT TO UNDERSTAND THE ABAKHOONE BRAVERY

Throughout the history of abakhone, one narrative has remained consistent. This is the narrative of the bravery and fearlessness of abakhoone people. I always wondered how this trait become ingrained among abakhoone to the extent that even their enemies acknowledged this quality by nicknaming abakhoone, Abaofu, meaning blind men.

My research on the origin of this quality too me to the situation in the west. It has largely been acknowledged that white men in the West are largely fearless the things that other groups of people are fearful of. Research by Kahan (1994) on cultural differences when it comes to risk perception could be used to explain the abakhoone fearlessness.

Kahan (1994) has identified a phenomenon called "the white male effect". This phenomenon is such that white men tend to be less fearful of the things that other races find scary. A similar observation was made by Flynn, Slovic and Mertz (1994). 

Kahan says that "Perhaps white males see less risk in the world because they create, manage, control and benefit from so much of it. Perhaps women and non white men see the world as more dangerous because in many ways they are more vulnerable because they benefit less from many of its technologies and institutions and because they have less power and control". Similar findings were reported by Finucane, Slovic, Mertz, Flynn and Satterfeld (2000).

From Kahan's research, it is because the white men have been in control of world for the past 600 years of the modern history. This domination has made them get less fearful of the world. If I compare with the history of abakhoone, abakhoone completely dominated their neighbors for hundreds of years. They never believed that anybody could stand their ferocity whether they came as individual or combination of groups.

This sense of control of the means of violence  made abakhoone to grow fearless because they benefited from that violence by expanding their territories no expelling from their vicinity any clan they considered a nuisance.

This is why I want to urge abakhoone to compete for and secure political power. If you are not in charge, your offspring will grow timid with a focus on seeking to protect their identity instead of going out to share what they have. They will grow fearful and less confident.

References

Finucane, M., Slovic, P., Mertz, C.K., Flynn, J. & Satterfield, T.A. Gender, Race, and Perceived Risk: The "White Male" Effect. Health, Risk, & Soc'y 3, 159-172 (2000).

Flynn, J., Slovic, P. & Mertz, C.K. Gender, Race, and Perception of Environmental Health Risk. Risk Analysis 14, 1101-1108 (1994).

http://www.culturalcognition.net/blog/2012/10/7/checking-in-on-the-white-male-effect-for-risk-perception.html