“No man has ever been born a Negro hater, a Jew hater, or any other kind of hater. Nature refuses to be involved in such suicidal practices”. This presentation will focus on the events, personalities and factors that have contributed to the growth of prejudice. Also the current situation and policies that have been developed to control the discrimination as well as how social theory has attempted to explain the ethnocentric actions towards the Jewish people. Prejudice is a critical opinion formed against a person or group based on a stereotype. Anti-Semitism is prejudice actions against or hatred towards Jews. The prejudice towards the Jewish people has been caused by the values, attitudes and beliefs of particular religions and cultures.

All over the world, people come into regular contact with other people who look different, and perhaps also think and live differently. When there is competition for resources, employment and housing, differences in language, religion and culture may become exaggerated. In this situation, there can be suspicion, tension and sometimes violence between the different ethnic groups. This can also cause cultural conflict between different ethnic groups and can change cultural boundaries and lead to the destruction of a culture. Throughout history, the Jewish people have been persecuted because of these culture clashes. They have a different religion and culture to the majority as they were often seen as stateless people, forming the minority in many countries. They had been blamed for, and made the ‘scapegoats’ on many terrible occasions like the death of Jesus Christ.

The greatest, most horrendous example of prejudice towards Jewish people was in Germany under the power of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi party. For many Germans, the Nazi’s seemed to bring nothing but promise after a humbling defeat in World War One and economic depression. This especially made the Nazi’s the most superior. The Nazi party had very mono cultural attitudes. Hitler encouraged ethnocentric actions against the Jews. Based on Bourdieu’s theory, those in power dominate. The Jews were inferior. They were very successful in businesses and had economic capital. This enraged Hitler, and he called the Jews 'parasites' for entering European countries and making good lives for themselves and holding good jobs in society. The Jews did not have any capital, mainly in the areas of power, religion and culture. They were the minority and did not have the majority’s capital in the mono cultural society. Society saw them as different to themselves so they were stereotyped because of their different attitudes, values and beliefs.

The belief that Hitler had was seeing the Jews as something less that human. The misinterpretation of Darwin’s ‘Survival of the Fittest’ theory of evolution of animals led some to see particular races as superior and some races destined to die out. He believed, by breeding a superior race, the world would look upon him as the man who pulled humanity up to a higher level of evolutionary development. He seemed to use this to justify racism and ethnocentrism to the majority of the German people. He led them to believe