I am sick of self-labels and subcultures

[Squishdiboo]

I am getting so tired of hearing people talk about how they're "so punk rock" or goths or emos or ravers or whatevers, accusing others of not being "punk/goth/emo/etc" enough and not doing a damn thing for themselves.

It makes me sick.

Why is it that people have problems with stereotyping, but they have no problem calling themselves a certain thing and spending all their time trying to be that?

It's not even just the music people. It's nearly everyone.


"OH EM GEE I'm such a gamer."

"I'm so country! Git er done!"

"I'm a gangsta, dawg."

"I'm so azn!"



People need to quit making up names for what they are and following the crappy little trends, and to start thinking and becoming individuals.



BEFORE I PUNCH THEM.





In conclusion: go ahead and like the things you like, and do the things you like to do, but quit calling yourselves something because of those things. We are all people with our own opinions, and making up labels for yourselves based on a majority of the things you like is lame and just limits you to being an uninteresting cookie-cutter person.

And as I stated, if you don't cut it out, I WILL PUNCH YOU.

[Keith T. Hemari]

This is a conclusion I came to a few months back and it really does make you wonder.

But, it should be said, the human mind tends to work with categories. Generalization is one of the key elements of our mind, it allows us to identify potential risks without specific experience. Just imagine what it would be like if we had to experience everything before we could make a decision. We'd never get anywhere.

That said, though, I think the media in particular is responsible for the modern proliferation of these stereotypes. Since television is usually made for the lowest common denominator, characters often take on a very stereotyped, cookie-cutter personality. This in turn becomes what people think of when they think of those groups. Combine that with the supposed celebration of individuality and you get people who celebrate their adherence to social stereotypes.

It's a sick twist of the individuality movement that it has created more people who lack individuality. Somehow instead of letting everyone be what they want to be, we now insist that everyone choose some sort of social cast and stick with it. Even the so-called outsiders of society are part of a cast. Rejects are now a class unto themselves. The only people who are outside the stereotypes are those who steadfastly refuse to associate themselves with a social class at all.

I remember one experience in school in particular. They were doing a survey about what social classes were strongest in the school. The students doing this eventually got 'round to me and I was faced with the following choice: Do you think of yourself as: A - a preppy, B - A jock, C - A Nerd, or D - An outsider(by which they meant a Reject).

Or options to that effect. I effectively said I was E - Myself(AKA none of the above), but that seemed to not go over well, so I just said to put down D and they were happy to have a form answer to give. That experience really put things into perspective for me at the time. All these social groups in school suddenly seemed like classes from an RPG. Something that people pick and choose from a list, rather than just being by nature.

So, yeah. You're right. It's stupid. Just be yourself and like whatever you want to like and who cares what cast you fit in.

[CrazyMrLēo]

People like to belong to things, which is why they join clubs, cliques, and internet forums. That being said, cookie-cutter people are more movie cliches than anything else. If you get to know most of those people, you'll find that they have no problem being unique and having a label at the same time.

[Merry Smindmas]

I started typing something then I saw Leo's post, and yeah, I pretty much agree with that.

[Ultra Magnus]

I'm a mut

Gamer, Nerd, Bando, Kid, and many many more

[Blues]

I'm a FAT

:<

[Keith T. Hemari]

I think the problem is not so much the labels themselves but that there is a certain contingent of people who only know labels and demand that the people around them fit those labels or they're "not really" what they claim to be. Like saying you're not really a gamer if you don't own all the latest systems, for example.

That said, I tend to reject labels, if only because they tend to be too easily misunderstood or misconstrued, when one's view point on a particular group does not match up with another persons. Consider the 'Furry' label. Some people think that the 'Furry' label instantly means that those people are into bestiality and/or think they are some sort of animal in human skin, while others think of it as just someone who identifies with a more animalistic side of the human psyche. To some, the Furry label would make a person, who, in all other situations would be completely unobjectionable, in to a horrible animal-fancying pervert.

For that reason, I don't tend to think in labels. It's too easy to be misunderstood or misunderstand a person, if you allow labels to become definitions. Rather, I look at each person as a unique case and decide my opinion on them without applying any labels that might bias my opinion. They are just who they are, and nothing gets in the way of weather I like them or not.

As I said above, though, generalizations are a good thing, to a certain extent. Truth probably lies somewhere in the middle acceptance of labels without relying entirely on them for decision making.

[Squishdiboo]

crazymrleo said:

People like to belong to things, which is why they join clubs, cliques, and internet forums. That being said, cookie-cutter people are more movie cliches than anything else. If you get to know most of those people, you'll find that they have no problem being unique and having a label at the same time.

You don't know some of the people I know.

[Robert]

Humans are social creatures by default. Even most of those who are "comfortable being loners" rarely really are, and, given a chance to belong to some group, even if temporarily, find some kind of contentment there. Even the earliest human civilizations survived as hunter/gatherer tribes, which suggests its been in our blood since the beginning. What it comes down to is, there are new "tribes" with different formations, but still based on our instinctual need to belong to something. I think modern society has severely complicated what these things are supposed to be, and definitely started up one too many "you must join or you are a lesser being" type of groups (whether we're thinking schoolyard or religious, either way...) Of course, as history tell us, even tribes fought wars with each other, so maybe all we're doing is continuing a modernization of our ancient battles. I guess that is, unfortunately, in our blood as well.

[Andrusi]

keithhemari said:

All these social groups in school suddenly seemed like classes from an RPG.

...I want to play that RPG.

[Keith T. Hemari]

andrusi said:

keithhemari said:

All these social groups in school suddenly seemed like classes from an RPG.

...I want to play that RPG.

Well there's The Sims and it's sequel, you know. Although that's not quite the same thing.

Heh.. I'm a level 10 Geek with a +5 Hard Drive of Memory Storage.

They'd better have multi-class options, because otherwise it would be way too limiting.

[Tenniru]

I'm a SubGenius. "Bob" is my subculture.

[Squiggles the Chao]

I find that the problem of such subgroups largely disappears after high school, and even moreso after college.

[Seph]

What Squiggs said.

[NeroKid]

I'm a Post-modernist.



Also a conceptual cubist.

[Matsrik]

INTP.

[diablohead]

What is love?

[Sofox]

Frankly I'm stunned about the detections of American High Schools that come accross to me here. I mean, I know a school can be messed up but the blatant stereotyping and defined personality types... I just can't believe that school students can be that role orientated.

Anyway, personally I find people are just so much more interesting when you learn about them for what they are, they always have their own quirks, or things you never expected of or know of things that barely crossed your mind, or behave in such interesting and unexpected ways that really make you have to reconsider your thoughts about them or wonder if you really know them at all. If you try holding a stereotype up to a real person, even someone who roughly fits it, you always find contradictions, things the person has that doesn't fit in with the stereotype, things that seem to go against it and you soon realise how hopelessly inadequate stereotypes are and how much more interesting and informative it is to take someone for what they are on their own merits in their own way, quirks and everything.

[Robert]

sofox said:

Anyway, personally I find people are just so much more interesting when you learn about them for what they are, they always have their own quirks, or things you never expected of or know of things that barely crossed your mind, or behave in such interesting and unexpected ways that really make you have to reconsider your thoughts about them or wonder if you really know them at all.

I've seen this is many people. But few people ever get to know me personally. My anxiety/paranoia mental health issues seem to scare most people off before they get a chance to see who I am past my illness barriers... worse yet, I have swing moods, where someone is very interesting to me one day and then the next I am completely indifferent. I don't like that, but it's just the way my miswired brain seems to want to work.

[Squishdiboo]

squigglesthechao said:

I find that the problem of such subgroups largely disappears after high school, and even moreso after college.

It's only become more annoying since high school.