Hey!
Hola!
Vanakkam!
Yo!
Good morning!
These are the first words that drop out of my mouth whenever I see someone for the first time on a day (I like it very much when these words just flow powerfully and cheerfully like a fresh aromatic dose of caffeine). And immediately after the greeting, the Pokedex in my mind pops out to reveal the information I have about that person. Now, this part is really important, because this information will greatly influence the next thing that I am about to say to them. Of course, the way they look that day, the way they carry themselves, their responses, or just one of those million other things beyond my control do matter.
But when the ‘impression’ inside your head is stronger than the expression presented before you irrespective of how elaborate or explanatory it is, you tend to hit that override button in the back of your mind. It does not happen always, but when you do hit that button, you deny yourself the opportunity to learn something new about someone which could potentially help you further your endeavours with that certain someone.
The best examples of this can be found at schools and colleges where a bunch of kids give another kid a nickname/identity that sticks with them for a long time, sometimes this can be as long as a lifetime. A few months back, I visited one of the schools where I was a student in the past. It was not exactly a walk down the memory lane kind-of visit but I went there representing one of my cousin brothers for a PTA meeting (since my brother and his wife were out of town and my 6-year-old niece who was in class 2 wanted me to come). The years were not kind to the buildings but then the place had changed so much that it almost felt unfamiliar to me. There was hardly anyone I knew but then they let me inside since I was with my niece and also because I still had a unique rap sheet over there ;).
I met her teachers and other parents, some of them who were more clueless than a non-parent like myself lol, and then I sent her off with her friends to have lunch. I was about to leave when something in me wanted to take a stroll through the campus. And thus began my “walk down the memory lane” and it stopped at this really old looking classroom 7. As I was looking through the windows of the classroom, my mind re-winded itself to playback my own memories. Years ago, it was a classroom housing a notorious batch of 30–35 kids. Unlike the traditional first bencher-last bencher bull shit, this class had random people occupying random seats with no concern for chronology or hierarchy. There were 3 columns and 6 rows of benches. Each bench could hold 2 -3 kids depending on how close they were.
Back then, to the average eye, we must have looked like a bunch of 13–14years olds sitting together. But that was not even close to the identities that we either took upon ourselves or were bestowed upon by the others. Among us, we had ‘cool’ kids who had all the cool toys, we had ‘giagantos’ who were too big for the standard sized seats they occupied, nerds/padippalis who sold their souls to remember all the dates and details from those heavy tomes we carried, class clowns who existed only for our entertainment, dummies who existed only to make others look good, sports freaks who wouldn’t know what to do with themselves without a football or a cricket bat nearby, daydreamers who had no freaking idea of why they sat there, there were those sleeper cells who snored their way to graduation, and the list goes on and on for every individual who shared the same roof with me. I don’t even remember why each of us got our respective labels. I just know that it all started with one person naming another person for fun or over a feud and a few others giggling their way over it and lo! he/she was stuck with that definition until graduation.
To get a better grasp of this, I am going to narrate an incident involving a good friend of mine from my previous occupation, Vikram (not his real name) as an example. One of the most logical and practical persons I have had the good fortune of being acquainted with, he is good at reverse-engineering stuff and finding solutions to problems swiftly and he loves carrot rice way too much. He once got involved in a huge argument with one of the officers who tried to manipulate certain things and at the end of it, he won. Not ready to accept defeat honourably, the other guy cooked up a really vile name for Vikram and strung him up in all sorts of messed up stories. Our multi-national crew was a really small community and some crew members found this entertaining. They too joined the bandwagon just to get a kick outta this. Rumours spread like wildfire and stories got more and more twisted. Having grown a thick skin over his years at sea, Vikram chose to ignore these baseless claims and focused more on his job. One fine day there was a problem onboard during his watch and he was summoned by the chief. Things were not in his favour, on top of that the rumours had given him a very bad rep among the crew. Lucky for him, he had the habit of logging all his watch routines and our chief was a logical person and not a blind believer of bullshit. The chief had it investigated properly before resolving the issue peacefully. That said, the resolution took some time and the others used this gap as a way to push him further into madness. Though he got his honour back, this incident left an emotional scar on him and to this day, he finds it hard to trust people.
Back to my memory trail, I tried hard to remember the names of my classmates, their real God-given names. But it was futile. I could hardly recollect the names of 4–5 people. And then there was this thing. I could remember every damn significant detail and just not their names. And then it hit me! I was remembering every classmate of mine, not for who they actually were but for who I believed they were. In simple terms, I could remember each and every one of them by their nicknames or the stories that surrounded them at that point in time and this really surprised me. It didn’t sit right with me, so I rushed myself to the office room to look into the records from those years. 2 hours later, I found them, their names, addresses and guess what, my school was even maintaining an alumni record of sorts. With the help of those records and facebook, I was able to reconnect with some of those guys and girls and find out what they are up to these days.
And guess what? The nicknames that I remember so vividly had nothing to do with the names and titles they hold today. One of the oversized giantesses from back then had transformed herself into the hottest person I know right now while some others who were deemed attractive are no longer easy on the eyes. A couple of dumb and the dumber guys of those days are now interns at famous R & D labs and establishments across the world. Few nerds are now pursuing corporate careers and safe jobs. People who, not even in our wildest imagination we thought would date were now married and they now have a nice little family in Dubai. One of the sports freaks had become a music teacher. Some daydreamers ended up as doctors and dentists. There was even this cool kid who had renounced the world and had become a monk in Tibet. And the one person who was supposed to be the scaredy cat of my batch is now serving our great country in the BSF. Amongst us, there was one guy who was not so lucky since a terminal disease happened to love him more than anything else in this world. Another mate had sadly ended it through his own hands even before his journey had begun for reasons that I am not at liberty to share.
It was totally crazy I tell you! What I thought was a simple parent-teacher association (PTA) meeting turned out to be one of the most significant days of my life. I was given a very important realisation that day. People are not what they seem to be, they are what they are and how they express themselves. And then when I look around and I see people promoting rumours and people who prefer to consume those promoted versions of other people over the choice of finding the truth for themselves.
I ask all of you, have you ever wondered about all those people who suffer due to the labels and opinions we stick on them? How many kids think that they are dumb because they fail a couple of math tests? How many of them move away from society and no longer trust another person just because they were called freaks and weirdoes by those who weren’t human enough to understand them? How many people convince themselves every day that they are a failure, an ugly, powerless, hopeless and choiceless existence, just because they were made to feel that way by people around them? Attentive parents with kids who have been/are being bullied will understand this better than anyone.
Are labels and preconceptions really that bad?
Well, it depends on what it is all about. It normally starts out as harmless fun or as a way to break the ice between two or more people. Nicknames and pranks are a great way to build a lasting bond, but only as long as it does not hurt or diminish the confidence of the people in question. While these things seem to keep a conversation flowing, they can sometimes push a person to do stupid things like drugs, fall into obvious social traps or do horrible things like taking their own lives or that of others.
So why do we do this? There are a lot of reasons, but in a broader sense, it boils down to a couple of things (also, this list does not apply to everyone).
1) Most humans are lazy to explore and experience things by themselves. So to increase our odds of survival, we are taught to rely on the experience of others and learn from it. (It’s probably one of the reasons why most of us don’t start a company and instead work for one since startups are high risk ). Sadly, this trend is not limited to our view of things and it extends to the people we meet. Have you ever come across a situation where an acquaintance of a co-worker joins your team and immediately you either get a flood of information coming your way or you by yourself ask around about the new member directly or “indirectly” from your co-worker? It’s always good to know what’s new in town but at the same time, one must remember to take in everything with a grain of salt.
2) Some of us are too busy to pay attention. That’s a lie we have been telling ourselves since the age of industrialization. But this happens when we are so caught up in our fast and furious lives that we often form templates for every routine task. And some of us tend to confuse people watching with pepperoni and we hastily put the people we meet into those neat little ready-made boxes in our minds based on a so-called first impression.
3) Some of us brainwash ourselves thinking popular trends and TRP ratings make up for everything, the truth is just over-rated.
4) Some of us just hate being the dumbest person in a room and so we tend to work backwards by making someone else look dumber than us. And we are known to be so ‘creative’ here.
5) Some people are too complicated to be comprehended. So, put them in whatever box you think suits them the best.
I may sound biased here but then, the underlying problem in our circuits is just that worse. We, humans, are sometimes really bad at drawing lines. We randomly connect things, decorate it with fancy terms and we promote them through gossip. Once a story becomes popular, it needs maintenance, and we do that by putting people into blocks/categories that are currently trending. And before your version of a person reaches the 6th person in your circle, there are new sequels to go along with it. And that’s how we create a ‘real person’ out of nothing while not giving a damn about what a person really is.
So, how do we fix this?
Now, there’s good news and bad news here. The good news here is that this behaviour of labelling people and assuming things about them is just a mental mechanism that helps you fill in the blanks using assumptions, borrowed (but unverified) information or just your imagination whenever you have incomplete information about something or someone. Any bugs in this program can be fixed by you as soon as you pay real ‘attention’ to your own thoughts and deeds before accepting the garbage that is usually fed to us. It also helps if you can be a little proactive and curious while doing your best to understand people from multiple instances and impressions before coming to a conclusion.
The bad news here is that this habit, it’s like a succubus that has wrapped its legs around your head. You know that it can kill you but then it’s not easy to (more like you don’t want to) let go of it. And its hold upon you will only get tighter as time goes by until you don’t know where you begin and where it ends. Gradually you lose yourself and your curiosity to the jaws of this beast. In simple terms, this can be addictive, even compelling at times to the point that it becomes second nature for a few of us wherein we fool ourselves thinking that we really understand people when the truth could not be any further from it. This is especially true for those so-called ‘Casanovas’ who seem to con the world into believing that they possess a backdoor key to the hearts of something as unpredictable and complex as a woman (I am sure every man who ever got himself married to a woman at some point in his life will agree with me here) or those ‘walking psychologists (more like psychos behind a conveniently twisted logic)’ who love to throw around a few unpronounceable terms and “medical” conditions around every emotion from some random book that they sleep upon every night. Don’t stoop to their level. You are more capable and much cooler than that!
Like MJ says in his song “Billie Jean”, do think twice! Do think twice before you believe anything or act upon unverified information, especially if it’s about another person. Make the effort to see people for who they really are and believe your own instincts. Doing this will not only save more lives than we can imagine, it will also save your humanity. Peace!
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Disclaimer: I do not own the image/meme used on this post. I borrowed it from a random site on the internet. All image rights and credits belong to its rightful owner and I do not intend to use it for monetary or academic purposes. So, there you go!
What I do own are my words. In-order grow as a person and as a writer, I request anyone and everyone who reads this blog to share your genuine feedback and comments with me. Thanks!
