Ethnocentricity De-\$tizes IP Communcations...

and really just about anything. I first participated in a debate regarding the concept, benefits, and disadvantages of ethnocentrism in 1980 during an Economic Geography class under a professor Dr. Doerr at the University of West Florida. In Wikipedia, it is defined as \"Ethnocentrism is the tendency to look at the world primarily from the perspective of one's own culture. Ethnocentrism often entails the belief that one's own race or ethnic group is the most important and/or that some or all aspects of its culture are superior to those of other groups.\" Laura Guevin refers to it in her 2000 article, in a positive way.

This is one of the biggest blocks to moving a company ahead in the global economy of IP communications. We don't want to talk about it, but I read the evidence of it every day in my work email for DIDX among 1000s of industry leaders and newcomers. Here are some examples of statements included by them in emails to me.

Watch out for the Chinese. They are sneaky.
Japanese will only do business with Japanese.
I don't do business with Jews. He's Jewish. I don't trust him.
How come you have so many Paki customers?
She's a blonde, so she can't possibly understand.
A woman just joined the list. OMG.
We don't trust Muslims. They're all you know... 
Indians take years to make a decision. It's a waste of time.
All the scams are Nigerian-based.
Mexicans are not reliable.
Americans are Godless spoiled bullies.
Argentians are too good for themselves.
Caribbean business people are lazy.
That company is just a bunch of rednecks. The CEO even has a Hummer.
Don't wear red or people will think you're communist at the conference.
\"Fill in the blank\" is the only protocol we will ever use.
We can't because they're based in a socialist country.
He's so unprofessional, always in shorts and tshirts.

My final comments here: what a loss of market share, partnerships, customers, revenue, friendship, innovation and more...

for every single one of these people from these companies who make the comments and actually believe them.