Crab mentality

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Crab mentality describes a way of thinking best described by the phrase "if I can't have it, neither can you." The metaphor refers to a pot of crabs in which one tries to escape over the side, but is relentlessly pulled down by the others in the pot.

This term is broadly associated with short-sighted, non-constructive thinking rather than a unified, long-term, constructive mentality. It is also often used colloqially in reference to individuals or communities attempting to "escape" a so-called "underprivileged life", but kept from doing so by those others of the same community or nation attempting to ride upon their coat-tails or who simply resent their success.

[edit] In different cultures

For Filipinos, crab mentality is the tendency to "outdo another at the other's expense"[1] or to "pull down those who strive to be better."[2] An overzealous leader becomes morally shamed.[3] It "became a call for community leaders to acknowledge indebtedness to others and to work for the good of the entire community and not just for themselves."[2]

In Hawaii, it is known as the 'alamihi syndrome, an 'alamihi being a local black crab. Hawaiians are criticized behaving like 'alamihi, which "always manage to pull down the ones who are trying to climb up and over the sides of a bucket."[4] Similar analogies are used against natives in other areas, such as Maoris in New Zealand, coastal Indians in Canada and the United States, and Chamorros in Guam.

It has been suggested that African Americans have inherited a cultural crab mentality based on a "doomsday mentality," because in times of slavery and segregation it was difficult, if not impossible to for them to use education even after it had been acquired.[5]

[edit] References

  1. ^ Beyond a Western Bioethics: Voices from the Developing World by Angeles Tan-Alora, Josephine M. Lumitao
  2. ^ a b Between Law and Culture: relocating legal studies edited by David Theo Goldberg, Michael C. Musheno, Lisa C. Bower
  3. ^ Honor and Shame: Unlocking the Door By Roland Muller
  4. ^ Ku Kanaka, Stand Tall: A Search for Hawaiian Values by George Hu'ei Sanford Kanahele. p.450.
  5. ^ Long Way to Go: Black and White in America by Jonathan Coleman. p.94.

[edit] See also