- All iPhone owners are sheep - too stupid to realize their phone is inferior to any of the Android offerings and willing to line up for a shiny paperweight.
- All Muslims are evil and are only out to hurt America.
- All poor people are just lazy and don't want to better themselves and just want to mooch off of the government.
I assure you these are not my views on any of those listed above. What has happened to us that we so easily stereotype someone? I bring these three up because they have all been prevalent in my social network circles (Facebook and Google+).
The iPhone vitriol was much, much worse on Google+ than Facebook. I think so because Google developed Android and Android users have naturally flocked to Google+. I'm not saying all of them, but I notice more support for Android than Apple's iOS there. The derogatory statements made over, of all things, a phone. I read an article written that compared these arguments to kids in high school making fun of others because they didn't wear the trendy clothes or have the right shoes on.
Muslims are being persecuted because some radicals are using a pathetic attempt at slander to rile up the troops and bring down the infidels. If you look though, you'll see a lot of support from many Muslims in those same countries where they are rioting trying to support and protect our people there. Saying all Muslims are evil would be the same as saying all Christians are evil because of the movie made that they are protesting or 1000 years ago when the Christians invaded the Middle East in the name of God to use any means necessary to eradicate the Muslim faith.
And of course the lazy people statement was thrust into the spotlight from the political statements (not intended for public consumption) by the Republican Nominee for President. I've seen statements supporting what he said like "the truth hurts" which I find absurd because not everyone you see receiving government support is lazy and/or willing to just leach off of the government for as long as they can. In fact I would be willing to bet that the majority of them would much rather have the opportunities that so many others have to improve their lot in life.
A person that I consider extremely wise taught me several things about 10 years ago when I first became a manager with the company I currently work for. She taught me about the value of diversity, that we need to embrace each others differences to make us all a better group as a whole. I was the quality manager at the time and one thing that she said to me has stuck with me ever since - "You can't assume a person is making the mistake on purpose". What I took away from that is, not everyone is out to do the wrong thing. I like to believe that as human beings we are inherently good. While we may have some bad eggs among us, the people that fall into the generalities listed above are few and far between.
Do we have the right to be mad at those bad eggs? Sure we do.
Is it fair to lump in the innocent with those bad eggs? Not at all.
I hope if you take anything from this post it's that you take pause before making a general statement to the public on these social media sites. Think before you speak, and realize that not all people are 'players'.
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