How to Avoid Stereotyping People?
Our beliefs are changeable
Stereotyping is a lazy way to judge people different from us. Stereotyping started off as an evolutionary tool when our ancestors belonging to small groups tried to make sense of people from other groups. Since it was impossible to know every individual in other groups, our ancient cousins started judging people by categorizing them as members of a particular group with distinct characteristics.
When civilization expanded to comprise sizeable groups, societies and nations, humanity not only kept the sense- making mental short cut to judge others, it refined it and turned it into a tool of prejudice and hatred.
Stereotyping is at the root of historical atrocities like slavery and the Holocaust, based on misconceptions about races and ethnic groups.
Modern culture sows the seeds of stereotyping early in life. Children learn and imbibe wrong notions about others from their parents, teachers and peers.
Over time, our wrong beliefs about other races, groups, religions, and nations strike deep roots in our psyche. It becomes difficult to dislodge wrong ideas once they get firmly implanted in our subconscious minds unless we make concerted efforts to question our beliefs.
Even the most rational people may not be aware of their biases, which lurk beneath their conscious minds.
Political polarization, racial prejudice, and religious conflicts have divided democratic societies everywhere. The so-called progressive societies are being torn apart by bitter ideological battles in the name of race, religion and politics.
The stereotyping itch seems to override common sense and arouses tribal instincts when people judge others through the prism of preconceived notions. Nobody, even the highly educated persons, are immune from this virus of extrapolating from the general to the particular because they are not even aware of their own inherent bias towards stereotyping.
The pleasant news is we are not slaves of stereotyping impulses. We can overcome inherent prejudices if we are serious. Many people have shown it is possible to resist the pull of pigeonholing. Let us examine how we can resist the allure of stereotyping.
Treat people as individuals and not as members of groups
Stereotyping involves the negation and subsuming of individuality into group identities. The group is disparate from its parts. Individuals have unique character traits and abilities that are not necessarily tied to their group identities.
America’s black-white divide is rooted in mistaking the group as representing the individuals. Human potential for growth transcends race and ethnicity. Individuals differ in their abilities, cutting across the racial divide.
Journalist, Zaid Jilani, writing in Greater Good Magazine, cites the story of how the black pianist Daryl Davis changed the mindset of over 200 Ku Klux Klan (KKK) members.
In 1983, a white KKK member experienced a profound change in his life. While attending a concert by an all-white band in Maryland, he discovered that the pianist was a black man named Daryl Davis. Impressed by the black pianist’s performance, he approached him and struck a conversation with him. He invited Davis for a drink after telling him this was the first time he was having a drink with a black man.The KKK man learned from Davis that black pianists had enriched the genre and had influenced the style of many white pianists. He began to attend performances by Davis and transformed into a liberal white man.
When Davis later learned that the KKK had expelled his white friend, he befriended over 200 KKK members and convinced them to leave the radical organization.
Daryl Davis holding up KKK robes at Blues and Rock for Humanity in November 2017.
Get exposed to diverse cultures
It is comfortable to move in familiar groups of people who share many things with us. Navigating different cultural landscapes is a painful journey where we may have to reexamine and change our beliefs about others. That’s why many of us avoid undertaking the journey.
Our exposure to different cultures will dispel many myths about groups we held as incontrovertible truths.
The battle against stereotyping should begin from homes and schools. Parental influence on children’s perception of the world is huge. Early childhood impressions about others can shape the future adult behaviour. Children brought up in liberal homes where parents inculcate the spirit of acceptance of diversity will grow up to be tolerant of other cultures.
Multi-ethnic schools are the vanguard in the battle against negative typecasting of groups. Cross-pollination of cultures dispel inter-group misconceptions and prejudices.
Be open-minded and question your assumptions
We are not prisoners of our beliefs. We can investigate the validity of of our assumptions about other cultures provided we develop an open mind, and a willingness to be our own Devil’s Advocates.
Till a few years back, I had fixed notions about capitalism, liberalism and conservatism. My overexposure to liberal literature had made me suspicious of conservatism and free markets.
I have the knack of stumbling into books that shook my foundational beliefs.Many times, I have serendipitously got introduced to book recommendations by authors I had never read before.
I came across the book, “Intellectuals and Society” by black intellectual Thomas Sowell. I bought this book from Amazon. Reading this book was a tremendous revelation for me. It shattered my negative preconceptions about conservatives. Sowell’s prose is sometimes verbose, but his ideas hit me like a sledgehammer.
I was exposed to the conservative viewpoints on equality, justice, discrimination, and free markets. I realized that there was merit in some conservative arguments. Sowell’s arguments seemed prescient about America’s ongoing cultural wars. After reading Sowell’s book, I developed an open mind about the liberal-conservative disputes.
Conclusion
Stereotyping mocks human claims to superior intelligence over other species. It negates the notion that humans are capable of thinking and acting rationally. Pigeonholing other people and groups into categories dilutes our ability to understand other cultures. It breed intolerance and causes divisions in society.
We can overcome our innate tendency to stereotype if we expose ourselves to other cultures, treat people as individuals and not as belonging to specific groups, cultivate an open mind, and engage in critical self-examination.
Thanks for reading.
