Does it bug you when people live down to negative stereotypes?

I fancy myself to be tolerant. I try to judge people on their actions, not their affiliations, from gender to religion. Part of this is remembering that stereotypes don’t apply to many, or most, members of a group. As such, I find it really frustrating when people do act out all the negative images of their race/gender/creed/sexuality.

For example, the aboriginal reserve near my city is having major problems with drug and alcohol binges because the compensation money for the abuses at the residential schools has arrived. This is exactly what many, many people around me expected to happen, just because they were “Indians”–they couldn’t be expected to do anything else. Now they have that much more ammunition against people who don’t deserve a bad reputation, but have one because of a number of idiots.

Has anyone else had this happen? It upsets me, not because it challenges my opinions, but because it seems to reinforce the bigotry around me.

Perhaps understanding the reasons behind the drug and alcohol abuse on reserves would come a long way in helping your reinforced bigotry.

It’s a bleak existence with unemployment, poverty, and continued subjugation by mainstream society.

We all know that they don’t need to live on the reserve. But that’s where family and friends are and it’s vicious circle we’ve helped create for them.

I feel sorrow, personally.

I’m glad another Canadian responded. It hurts me to see this, especially since my mom teaches G.E.D. prep (for the test to get your high-school diploma) and even her students–people who obviously want to improve their lot in life–are getting sucked back down by the money.

This is true of many people though, not just those in this particular group. How many lottery winners end up with millions of dollars and then spend it all on expensive liquor and Cadillac Escalades and wind up with nothing to show for it 10 years later? I do understand what you are saying though and I think that it is sad when people choose not to rise above the negative things expected of them.

I think that’s exactly it, more succinctly than I could put it.

I just realized I never did answer the question. The only time I would say it bothers me is when those negative things reflect back to me. For example, it must have been 2 years ago now that a woman in Florida (I believe it was Florida at any rate, I might be wrong about that) died because she never moved from her couch and grew to be 600 lbs and sat on the sofa for so long her skin literally grafted to the fabric. She didn’t get up to go to the bathroom or anything. When they came to haul her corpse away they had to cut out part of the wall to get her body out of the house.

As a woman who is overweight every time I hear stories like this I cringe. I get regular exercise and I haven’t watched more than an hour of TV at a time in months. Since I moved to NYC I have lost 32 lbs because I no longer have a car and walk or take public transportation to get where I need to go. I take ballet and tap classes. I have my blue belt in Tae Kwon Do. I enjoy being active and while I might huff and puff if I have to climb several flights of stairs for the most part I have no problem keeping up with people thinner than myself. Despite these things, though, I know that every time a story about someone who is so fat that they got stuck in a revolving door or hasn’t moved in so long that they are growing mold in the folds of their skin makes the news that I will spend the next 48 hours being scrutinized far more than usual by the people around me because I am heavy. Just because 1 fat person didn’t move in months and grafted to her couch doesn’t mean that all fat people are headed towards the same end, and as much as I feel bad for that woman and I wish she could have gotten the help she needed I am angry with her for the extra example she is providing to those people who are already harboring predjudices against the obese.

Agree with pbbth, this mostly affects me when it’s “one of my own” that exhibits the negative stereotype.

I do get annoyed when I see things like that in other groups as well, but the fact of the matter is that a lot of negative stereotypes come from somewhere. Of course that’s no excuse to be prejudiced: an individual should be judged on their own actions, not the actions of others. However, it’s not so surprising that some people, for whatever reason, will fall into the stereotype.

I too hate when people conform to well-known stereotypes. It’s so cliche.

However…

It seems like this is a problem that people who do the stereotyping (whoever is the dominant group) don’t have. For instance, when I was in college it got drummed into me by well-meaning people that I, as a black woman, needed to be on my “best” behavior in class. Which meant showing up on time, answering intelligent questions, studying all night long, etc. Failing to do this would mean that I would be perpetuating stereotypes about Affirmative Action beneficaries, black people, women, etc. Meanwhile, the other kids were having fun and doing what most college kids do. What stereotypes were they worried about perpetuating? None, as far as I’m concerned. I should have been able to live such a carefree existence.

I’d say that’s the worse part of being stigmitized minority group. Just about everything regarding your being can fit into a stereotype since there are so many to choose from. I buck about all the stereotypes I can think of for my identity, but I know there are a few that I do perpetuate. When I was in high school, I was a class clown. My speciality was physical humor, with some dry wit thrown in. I’d get lots of laughs, so much so that I was voted Most Humorous. One day, a “friend” called me up and told me that I was nothing but an embarrassing Step-n-Fetchitt and that I should stop being so goofy. It didn’t matter to her that both black and white kids found me funny or that there was some intelligence to my buffoonary. It didn’t matter to her that I found it theraputic to intentionally make others laugh–that it was my way of coping with adolescent angst. All she could see was the stereotype of a black “clown” and that I was perpetuating it. I say fuck that shit.

I hate it when I see men acting like sex-crazed pigs. I know that it’s my own personal hang-up from the way I was raised, but it still annoys me when I see things like my male coworkers gather at the window because a hottie is down in the parking lot.

What a great example of professionalism, guys.

Ditto, I cannot standit when I see men acting a fool because there is a beautiful woman in the room or walking by or in a car etc…etc… Have some respect for women for crissake.

On to what the OP was talking about in regrds to Natives - I live near the largest single casino on the planet called Foxwoods Resort Casino tucked into the Connecticut woods it was started by the Mashantucket Indians. They were a small tribe 300 or so back in the early 90’s they only had a Bingo Hall and a smallish reservation - with members stretched out all over southeastern CT. Once they gained federal recognition and got the money to open a casino [from Malaysia] They started building, and building and building. They paid their 100 million dollar debt in less than 1 year and now they have the single largest casino on the planet.

How about those original 300 tribe members? I believe only a handful of that are full blooded Mashantucket but you only had to be 1/32 to get the 30k a month stipend from the casino. Yes 30,000 a month.

Most of the tribal youth had drug and alcohol problems (still do) - bounced in and out of rehab and eventually the crime rate on the rez hit an all time high in the late 90’s. Eventually leading to a breakdown in tribal relations and a revaluation of the monthly stipend…

Yeah, this is exactly what I’m talking about. Closely related is the phenomenon of people hiding behind negative stereotypes. “I’m a guy, so I’m supposed to be aggressively horny!”

My problem is when people try so hard to fit the stereotypes. I’ve never had the desire for anyone to look at me and think that I look exactly like a whatever.

Examples:
Cowboy hat, western shirt, wrangler jeans, big belt buckle, cowboy boots.
Long mullet, Led Zeppelin shirt
Overly sexy dressing asian girl
Pencil-protector, short sleeved dress shirt, thick glasses
Over-the-top gangsta wear, gold teeth, big bling
All black, ultra goth, disaffected youth.
Complete drama queen gay guy

on and on…

I guess I never wanted to fit in that small a cubby.

You hit the nail on the head. The reason people think money will buy happiness is because money actually will buy sensual gratification – the euphoria of good booze, the smell of a new car, the flavor of rich food. But what it won’t buy is a sense of self-worth. People (like me, at certain times in my life) who lack a sense of self-worth are unable to achieve psychic gratification – they just aren’t happy! So they reach for whatever gratification they can get, and the easiest is physical, because that’s the kind of gratification you can buy.

It’s the gay ones which bug me (even tho in the grand Seinfeldian tradition I certainly feel like there’s nothing wrong with that)-I’ve often wondered if the lisping, the feminine walking styles, etc. are just mere affectations or not.

I’ve heard that for some guys and ladies it’s a way of “flying the colors.” They play up the stereotype sometimes to assert their lifestyle or as a way of announcing status. A gay guy can probably improve his chances of scoring another guy if he’s broadcasting his gayness.

But yeah, over the top flamboyant stereotypes annoy me too.

Very much, but like others, only when it’s a stereotype that’s going to get applied to me.

For example, this Aussie in Osaka throwing bicycles at pedestrians and passing cars, generally acting like a drunken jackass, then pretending he doesn’t speak any Japanese once a garbageman slaps him around and hands him to the police, will be remembered by onlookers as “one of those gaijin,” And so he pisses me off far more than a Japanese person doing the same thing. The latter is an obnoxious pain in the ass. The former is an obnoxious pain in the ass that I get lumped together with.

Well, here’s something that bothers me – femme gay guys being mentioned in the same breath as alcoholism, disease, and antisocial behaviour, as if they were the same thing. Hint: they’re not.

It used to bother me when posters acted like drama queens and reacted to things that aren’t there, but I got over it. :wink:

Regards,
Shodan

Sure. Every time I see a thread here over some new stupid political development here in Texas (e.g. the current Pit thread over Master’s degrees in Creation Science), I feel a quick urge to say that I’m not really FROM Texas and I’m not like THOSE Texans. Then I say, “you know what? I don’t owe anybody an apology for the actions of elected officials I didn’t even get to vote for or against.”

IT’S ABOUT THE TOILET SEAT THING AGAIN, ISN’T IT?!?!?!!

I agree with you, by the way.