Stereotypes stealing our identity

Being raised in a community with many different races and religion could possibly mean higher toleration and no hatred among people who are different. In a place with many diverse sorts of people, it is hard to be different from anyone and it actually gives sort of a freedom. Maybe even freedom for development of individuality for anyone because it is no shame to be different. But what about places where diversity is very limited? Places where being different means being socially unacceptable for any group? Places where an individual must state his belonging to one of the groups? Well, it is little to say, but in such places, an individual has a very limited freedom of expression.



However, can we blame media for that? Well, we could. Media taught us to stereotype people. In my high school, we were all grouped according to style we were following. For example, there was a group of people who listens to hard rock, group of people following ‘red carpet’ trends, group of ‘nerds’ who were included in many studying activities outside of school, group of sportsmen, and finally there was a group of people who tend to criticize stereotyping and division into groups. Just like in American sitcoms, these groups don’t mix. If they do, it is worth gossiping about it and finally it ends negatively for whoever started the mixture.
Although I belonged to the group of critics, we never tried to do anything to distort the system because it was more than obvious that nobody cared. It was simply the way it should be.
When I was a senior in my high school, I made some friendships with people I went to dance school with. We all went to different schools, but we had dance practices together so we became very good friends. Then I realized that all of us have certain status in our high schools and we were afraid to step out because of the consequences. We were afraid to develop our individuality and finally feel good about ourselves. So why didn’t we do it sooner?



Many teenagers watch movies created exactly on the basis of stereotypes and the story is interesting only because two people from different groups fell in love. Although most of these stories have happy ending, there are groups that are shown to us. It is just like they are trying to tell us it is completely normal to be separated and to belong to just one group with limited possibilities and necessity to have many things in common with those people.


To conclude, media sends us a message that we are supposed to belong to one group, to be same as others in that group otherwise we will be socially unacceptable and rejected just because we are different. This is especially the case in small cities where people don’t have much choice: they must become ‘one of’ or grow up alone. Well, humans aren’t made to be alone, are they?