Other People’s Opinion

People always want you to be who they think you are. – David Cross

It’s easier for a lot of people if you would just quietly and consistently fit into a nice neat category so they can label you and not have to think about you. But, if you go against their stereotypes, they don’t care for you too much.

These stereotypes can be racial, sexual, sexual orientation based, religious, nationality based, or even what side of the city you’re from. Let’s not forget height, weight, and occupation. Whoever insisted that all fat people must be jolly should be shot. By the way, not all cops are Irish, either, nor are all tall people basketball players.

A lot of people are lazy and would prefer to put you in a category than get to know you as a person. Do I care what the cashier thinks of me? Not really. I’m fine with the cashier putting me in the category “customer” and thinking nothing else of me. That’s as far as our relationship goes – “customer and cashier”. But, if I have a coworker who decides that I’m “female” hence I am x, y, and z, then I have a lot of issues and problems. Unless x, y, and z are “has ovaries”, “has an x chromosome”, and “should be referred to as ‘she’ when speaking of her in the third person”, I’m probably being stereotyped. I am a person, not a category. I fit into a lot of different categories and labels, but what my label means to me and what it means to you could be very different things.

That’s the problem. My perspective on the world and yours differs. Some people don’t get that. They think that the way they see the world is the way it is AND the way that others see the world, too. That just ain’t so. But, they don’t want to bother, which makes me not want to bother with them. Because in my life, I need people who see me as a person, who are willing to deal with me as a person, who will respect me as a person rather disrespect me as “one of them”, and I’m not going to settle for anything less than that.

You shouldn’t either.