The danger of labels
If you label someone, you don’t see the person behind the label.
This also applies to generalizations: “You’re always late”, “you can’t do anything right”.
The interaction then is not with the person but with the image.
The person has their own feelings and needs, the label has none.
This promotes bias.
And it doesn’t help mutual understanding and emotional contact.
Why it’s so easy to label:
- It is habitual and sometimes even encouraged.
- It gives you a sense of entitlement. And justification for one’s actions.
- It allows you to avoid expressing your feelings, and your vulnerability. Communication becomes formal.
- You don’t have to understand the situation. The situation is drastically simplified.
Why it doesn’t help understanding:
- Blaming. Labels turn communication into right/guilty. People don’t like to be blamed.
- Getting personal. This is not constructive criticism of actions, but criticism of the person as a person. This provokes a counterattack.
- An enemy image. The label turns into an enemy image, instead of a person there is an image that one wants to fight. But there is no desire to understand.
Labeling is easy to do.
It can be fun and pleasant.
And it gives you a sense of superiority.
But everyone suffers from labels:
- Is the opportunity to blame more valuable than the opportunity for human interaction.
- It’s a habit, which means it can’t be turned off for a while.
- Works both ways. What prevents understanding of others prevents contact with yourself.
It’s a choice to label or try to understand.
It doesn’t matter if the accusations are directed at oneself or another.
Not always times this choice realized because it is not given attention.
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