IMHO, people put way too much stock in labels. I read once that the human thought process has a habit of categorizing and sub categorizing everything it takes in for organizational purposes or whatever. For example, mandarin is a type of orange, orange is a type of citrus, citrus is a type of fruit, fruit is a type of food/part of a plant, so on and so on…but the unfortunate thing is that we also do this with people.

You see somebody walking down the street, and your mind comes up with things automatically “hey, that guy has a nice haircut, he must take pride in his personal appearance, and he has nice shoes that match his outfit, he must be smart, wait, he’s wearing too much cologne, he must be a player” Which is a pretty effective system at first glance, in the previous example the girl next door saved herself from a misleading relationship ending in heart break by recognizing the game, check and mate, months of what would have been miserable self loathing can now be spent learning a foreign language or finding a cure for cancer…

But unfortunately there’s a less fortunate side to this system of thought: Generalization. Maybe he picked those shoes out himself, maybe his girlfriend did. If he read in a magazine what kind of shoes he should wear with his outfit does that inherently make him stylish? If he beats somebody to death in a public restroom and steals the shoes from the resulting corpse does that mean he can afford nice things?

“That girl in the corner is wearing a shockingly short skirt, she must be aching for the taking” “That guy in the letterman jacket must be thinking about foot ball” “That nerd at the desk is reading Isaac Asimov, he must want to get freaky with a robot.”

Then take it a step further, bring a cultural heritage, belief structure or religion into the mix: “That girl doesn’t believe in the correct religion so she’s going to burn for all eternity.” “That guy chooses to be gay even though he knows it’s wrong.” “He’s a man and men only think about sex.” “She’s a woman and women only care about money.” “Those crazy conspiracy theorists are all alike.” “Those white people are such posers.” “Those Latinos are so angry.” “That black guy’s going to mug me!”

These generalizations of people’s personalities are the same as generalizations of sex, race, creed and life style.

One might argue that the latter is at the far end of the same spectrum, but that’s just the point, it’s the same spectrum. You’re still judging that which you don’t understand based on what you think you know about the so called majority of a so called group.

And worse yet, people don’t even need to be labeled into these categories by others, they seem just as willing to do it themselves. “I’m outgoing, I’m shy, I’m depressed, I’m bipolar, I’m poor, I’m sporty, I watch this show because it fits my personality, I listen to this music because MTV says my demographic likes this kind of thing” maybe you’re depressed because your spouse left you, maybe you’re depressed because you think the world’s about to end, is it the same exact feeling? No. Do we label it the same way? Of course. And who knows what twisted completely incorrect message Joe Schmoe is going to derive from these labels you’ve conveniently posted on your forehead.

Maybe there’s another way. Maybe instead of analyzing everything in front of us we should work harder to understand the things inside of us. Maybe we can stop focusing on the differences and look at the things we have in common with one another. If two people follow two different gods that both profess we should be good to each other…wouldn’t it make sense to just skip the differences and be good to each other? Aren’t we all at least partially human? Don’t we all have the same basic needs? Stop acting like spoiled children, don’t just tolerate each other, accept each other, don’t stab blindly at that which you don’t truly understand, love people for what they are and the ideals we share, otherwise you’re just ing about the irrelevant, and nobody likes a , IMHO.

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