Do you stereotype?

Question

I like to think I take people at face value but underneath I think its part of human nature to judge on firt instincts.

Do you do this and do you feel bad when you find out you get it wrong?

whats the story GBL?

does anyone have any experiences when their first instincts have been good of someone who has turned out to be bad which has led them to stereotype a group of people?

Answer 1

Everybody does, I'm apparently a "coal mining, whippet racing, pigeon fancying, lard butty munching, gravy drinking northern monkey". And I call my work colleagues "Bed wetting, shandy drinking, caribou nibbling at the croquet hoops, flower pressing, soft sh*te southern ponces"

It's all in good fun honestly

Answer 2

There is, IMO, a HUGE difference between "stereotyping" and "first instincts".
Stereotyping is making a judgement about a person (or persons) AFTER you have gained some information about them.(otherwise you wouldn't be able to stereotype them unless it was a racial thing which I would never do anyway).
First instincts are subconscious judgements made BEFORE you know anything about a person and are usually based on body language, cleanliness and rapport. (which can be done without the fallacies of stereotyping)
So to answer the question NO I don't stereotype, because it usually denotes a high degree of snobbery and/or ignorance, but I do make decisions based on first impressions.
One of the biggest problems people face, imo, is that some people want to be stereotyped in one way but not another. Take chavs, goths, emo's, moshers etc They dress and to a certain extent, act in a manner dictated by their chosen "clan" in order to gain acceptance from their peers. They actually want to be stereotyped by their dress and demeanour.

Answer 3

As animals, we all use basic animal instincts to judge people at first sight. This is a sort of defence mechanism. After that we tend to steryotype by our human experiences, i.e. if all our experience of a certain race is that they do not work and tend to be drug dealers, then on average we will assume that they all do,until they prove otherwise.

Answer 4

Most definitely I do, but not the way you think.

I judge by someone's face, to get a general impression.
Then the first few seconds of their mannerisms. After that I have decided.
Their subsequent actions just serve to confirm my opinions.

I have been wrong a few times.
The worst one was a leached blonde stockbroker type with a money hungry face. His mannerisms and speech were typical of the type. And he does occasionally exhibit some quite reprehensible characteristics,
but I have never met a more caring or sensible person. I usually rely on him when things start going south amongst our group of friends.
As I have got to know him, I realised that he does his job to make money and survive. He takes those characteristics that best suit his environment. But that is not who he is.

There are very few like that, most of us look like exactly who we are. Faces and mannerisms are worldwide, judging someone by a colour, or cultural characteristic is just stupid.

Answer 5

I don't think anybody could put their hand on their heart and honestly say they don't.
How many times have us ladies crossed the road to avoid that strange man walking behind us?! We presumed a perfect stranger was a threat because he 'looked odd'.
It's impossible to not make assumptions and form opinions on people the first time we meet them. We don't even do it intentionally, it's definitely in our nature. It's our job to be open minded beyond that very first impression and form our opinion from then onwards.
There is however,a difference between first impressions and prejudice. The latter can be controlled as it is a judgement you make of somebody due to your own beliefs/attitude etc. You make your mind up, that they are what you believe them to be.
Meeting your best friends boyfriend for the first time, for example, and you immediately think how big his nose is.... You didn't intend to think that and you feel slightly ashamed and vow to think nice thoughts from then on!! That's a first impression opinion.
Deciding you dislike him because of his race or religion perhaps, that's pre-judging a person and i think that's when it's a direct reflection on your own personality and down-falls.

Answer 6

Im usually pretty good at giving everyone a fair chance but sometimes i take an instant dislike to someone for no particular reason.I find my instincts are usually right though.

Answer 7

People make stereo types...not cause of human nature but it is a "learned" behavior. I believe. Where initially do you get these "stereotypes" from?...could it be its learned at home?

Answer 8

Now who doesn't... and people that say they don't do. And don't think of it as a very high degree... Most of the stuff are true. You can be mixed types too so it affects how we see someone else.

Asians hard working, number crunchers, get high grades, like to solve problems, usually geeky, small eyes, cannot drive well, cannot see well, cannot speak English well.

Indians brown, cannot drive, do not know driving rules, have easy to copy accents, have our outsourced jobs for phones, cheap and have t mobile instead of cingular.

Black steal, lazy, waste our tax money, never even try to work, rap, wear big baggy clothes, not much cultural common sense..

White.. .too big of a race.. many different kinds.. so split to me.. too many to list..

Those are the main races to me..

Answer 9

i do this every day. it's common nature to group things together to help us better understand at that moment. it's later that you can realize you've made a bad judgment. and i of course feel bad when i've grouped someone into a category that i later discover was a lapse of bad intuition

Answer 10

Races are not from the same culture. So many have grown for generations being beat, raped, murdered and tortured.It does not seem that the affects of this treatment would affect the generations behind and those to come, but from what I have seen, we do suffer and act in different manors because of our ancestry. We are not prejudice because we do not like other races. Many of us just grow in cultures different than those we believe are ""civilized." Tom Sayer, maybe?