This ladies and gentlemen is what you occasionally get from random google results, but ignoring the host for a moment, Read and debate: Propaganda, Advertising, and modern culture

Personally I think it brings up a great many good points, and goes quite a ways in explaining why I'm so disillusioned with my generation.

 

Suuuure, random google result. Excuse me while I read the rest of the site and ignore the socio-political stuff that involves nothing dark nor erotic.

Edit: The fuck? Dark erotica apparently means angsty porn. DO NOT WANT.

 

Shady website aside, this was pretty insightful, if a bit overly dramatic.

On a whole though, I feel that stereotyping isn't necessarily bad. It's only harmful when it isn't done properly.

 

-Ignores Tehan as he was warned-

The mental conditioning bit struck a little closer to home for me. Granted The stereotyping bit was rather bad too, more so than the potential for misuse that you seem worried about. What's the first thing you would think of a person, regardless of how well they were dressed if they told you they were born and/or raised in a trailer park? Granted most people's second impulse would be to double check facts VS. stereotype, but the fact that you would even have the initial foregone conclusion is bad enough.

 

I'd disagree. I'll affirm again that stereotyping is fine as long as it isn't done wrongly.Stereotyping is merely approaching a situation with pre-determined bias.

And after all, to be biased is to be human. The thing that separates humans from other animals is our adaptability- our ability to learn quickly from our experiences and generalize that knowledge to future situations. Imagine if we had to approach every single situation completely without the influence of prior judgment. Sure, we would no longer have stereotyping.

But we would also be unable to do, well, anything. We cross the street upon seeing a green light with the assumption that no car will run us over. Imagine if every time we approached an intersection, we had to re-learn what all the different colored light are, and what traffic regulations are. Imagine the sheer waste of time and effort that would be.

Bias/stereotyping is a great ability that helps us save time and maximize our abilities to create and produce new things rather than leaving us forced to re-identify and re-learn old things.


tl;dr version: Stereotypes are useful because they allow us to generalize and move on with our lives.

 

I think of that more as generalizing or knowledge retention even if it does fall under the dictionary's defination of stereotype.

How much trouble could we be saved if we left that to objects rather than people as popular media portrays them? With no offence intended to any of the following groups, believing totally in popular stereotype would mean you think all blacks to be either rappers, sports fanics, gangsters, or druggies, probably some combination of any of the above. All whites are relitivally well-to-do stuck up bastards who are convinced of their own supiority and consider themselves above the law, hookers/Trailer park trash, and/or wanabee blacks. Indians are stuck up assholes who spend money faster than they get it and are all on welfare, anyone from the middle east has been raised muslim or jewish and have been involved in 'holy wars' since they could lift a weapon. Eurpoeans are all promiscuous snobs, and france is the cause of all of the worlds problems.

Most of which is all bullshit. wouldn't it be better to judge people by their actions rather than having perconcieved notions you have to work past before you see who and what a person really is?

 

Stereotypes are there for a reason and generally correct. They didn't just pop out of whities mouth because he was looking for another reason to put the black man down.

 

I liked the final point he made about experience.

WHO do you KNOW?
Have you ever met:

• A real Criminal?
• A real Hero?
• A real Romantic?
• A real Stalker?
• A real Witch?
• A real Cop?
• A real PI?
• A real Soldier?
• A real Stripper?
• A real political figure?
• A real rebellious Teen?
• Someone truly in Love?
• A real happily married couple? -- with children?
• Someone who Defied the stereotypes seen on TV?

It certainly seems true, we base our perceptions on what we know, and what we know often comes from T.V and other such forms of media.

 

1. Yes
2. Depends on whom you ask
3. no
4. no
5. yes
6. yes
7. no
8. yes
9. No
10. yes
11. yes
12. yes
13. Yes... To both
14. Frequently, yes.

Anything else I can help you with?