Back again, for a rant about stereotypes.
It seems as though it is natural for people to prefer to think of someone as one thing and one thing only. For example, if one were to see a girl with a tiny skirt, straightened blonde hair and plenty of make-up, the initial judgement would probably be, 'Slut/bitch.'
Problem is, this is probably true.
I have noticed that people try to fit themselves into a stereotype which takes their fancy, either consciously or unconsciously. If your friends have the slut-like characteristics mentioned above, chances are you will too, making you a clone.
Similarly, if you read a lot and have glasses, you are pegged as a nerd. This does not mean that you have to hang out with only nerds, push up your glasses incessantly and have no taste in clothing.
If you are a guitarist in a band, overage or otherwise, there is the compulsion to do drugs, to drink, to get a bunch of girlfriends, and to have a cool persona, i.e. hair, clothes, kind of quiet and 'mysterious'. It all fits in to the one stereotype of 'rocker/they're in a band.'
Why?
Take my friend Trisha for example - she is a guitarist, goes out almost every weekend and rides around on her step-dad's motorbike. However she reads, plays Pokemon at almost 16 years of age, studies hard, watches anime, reads manga, and fangirls out over bishies.
She is an enigma to the people who do not know her well (and even to those who do) because she does not wedge herself in a single category.
One of, I believe, the most wonderful things Trisha has ever said was when we ditched the disco/dance thing at camp. There were some girls who were just heading up, and one of them said, "Shouldn't you guys be at the dance? Why are you out here?" and she immediately came back with, "'Cause we're BADASS!"
Part of the reason the girls found this so hysterical could have been that they had pegged us as nerds, and did not expect such a cool, witty comeback.
Although I hesitate to use myself as an example, I've dismissed this hesitation.
I am a nerd. It's an undeniable fact. I get good grades, love to read, get along reasonably well with teachers, watch anime and read manga, fret and worry my head in, am an activist, am on crutches, don't put any effort into looking the way society wishes me to look, and am ugly. But I play the bass and guitar, go out one or two weekends a month, particularly to the city, am strong, and, if I do say so myself, I'm pretty darn hysterical.
The persona which is 'people' don't understand this though. If I say something clever or witty to someone who has pegged me as a nerd, they become completely lost - nerds aren't funny.
Cool people are funny.
Here's the thing: if you fit yourself into a stereotype, then everyone knows your weaknesses (thank you American television).
If you become a multi-dimensional character who knows more that you let on and do what you want to do, then you have acquired both the freedom which comes with being yourself unashamedly, and an immunity to the predictable and well-known weaknesses of the single-dimensional.
Now, I reckon it's stupid to say that there are two types of people in the world: x and y. Again, that's just casting a black-and-white stereotype and pigeonholing people just because you don't know them [as well as you think you do].
However to some degree, it is true to quote Oscar Wilde in saying, 'It is absurd to divide people into good and bad. People are either charming or tedious.'
If you have worked your way into the charming pile, this means that I haven't seen someone exactly like you before. You think things that I can't guess, have lived a life which is unpredictable by the clothes you wear or who you hang out with, and make me wonder about you and admire you.
However if you are tedious, you are everywhere. You are not you, you're one of a million clones out there who look exactly like you, act exactly like you, think exactly like you.
Now I don't know how other people think. Perhaps the bitches have reached a higher level of intellectual processing and development than I have and perfectly reasonable logic has taken them to bitch-hood and it is I who is mistaken and 'inferior'.
It is of course impossible for me to know whether, deep down inside, you are not the same as everyone else.
This is why I believe that you should not fit yourself into a stereotype. Don't show everything about you to the world, but rather set yourself apart from the world, proving that you are a charming person, regardless of how deep down this interest lies.
The only thing one risks by being an individual is the torment of clones who [I'm presuming] have not evolved the intellectual capacity to understand that the way that they are and the way that their 'friends' are is not the ideal human specimen.
Set yourself apart.
Prove what you can do with wisdom.
Humanity will stereotype you if you don't.
0 comments:
Post a Comment