Saturday, December 18, 2004
.:generalizing people:.we had a talk in philosophy club about stereotyping/generalizing people into groups. in its own right, stereotyping isn't really all that bad. we stereotype bears--bears eat people. obviously not all bears eat people, but when i see a bear i won't think, "oh yay, it's a pooh bear let me put honey on my hand and approach it!" why? because i've stereotyped all bears to be man-eating. have i done bears a great diserve? yes. am i alive? yes. now as much as i love animals, people are different, so accept it peta. generalizing people gets a little bit more iffy. i can't say "don't generalize people at all" because well, a lot of people do that and it's actually very hard to not generalize. what i can say is, if you have some generalization of a kind of person, and you meet that kind of person, don't start thinking about that generalization. don't think that all arab americans are terrorists who want to kill you. yes, there are some arabs (more in the middle east though) who hate america and want to kill us. but give the person you're meeting the benefit of the doubt. and if turns out you were wrong, well, run. actually, let me clarify what i said. you can think about the generalization, but please don't open your mouth. why? because you hurt that person--not necessarily his feelings... something a little deeper. and, you also make yourself sound stupid, uneducated and uncaring. so please, don't voice that generalization, especially to me, and most especially when you're generalizing latinos... i happen to be one.what the?!!?!?: ahh why are people so horrible to each other?from the ipod: sweetest goodbye by maroon 5on the tv: cnn, i believe
