No one should like being stereotyped. Not only is it insulting to you personally, it's downright offensive to an entire group of people. If you're not offended to your core by it, then you haven't been enlightened because it should offend anyone with a modicum of common sense. Sadly, most people are so apathetic these days that they can't muster up enough interest to care what's happening to others around them. But heaven forbid should someone, like the mainstream media, stick a label on them! That would just be wrong. Really? Wow, funny how self-interest will change a person's whole attitude.
Let's take a good look at what stereotyping by Hollywood, mainstream media and others has done to entire groups of innocent people. It's amazing what images come to mind when we hear certain words or think about certain concepts. When I say "trailer trash," an immediate image springs to mind. Do you conjure up images of white folks with little or no self-esteem living in a tin house on wheels? Are they drinking and/or doing drugs, riding Harley motorcycles, driving rusty cars and trucks when they aren't up on blocks, having too many children running wild in the streets with at least one wearing a dirty diaper and in need of a tissue for that snotty nose? Are the obese women wearing stretch pants and oversized t-shirts to shop at the local Wal-mart as the fat, lazy men sit around with their beer guts hanging out of undersized t-shirts watching the grass grow and guzzling cans of Keystone or whatever was on sale at the local Pak a Sak? Since "Trailer Trash" is a close cousin to "white trash," does that call up additional images of dirty, uneducated, white people with bad dental hygiene living in squalor in some rundown shack with a living room sofa sitting out front, in the knee high grass, where it's being used as lawn furniture? Do you imagine a rusty a car or truck sitting on concrete blocks somewhere in the vicinity of the sofa and at least three or four large mixed breed dogs napping under the sagging front porch? Apply the same descriptions from "trailer trash" to "white trash" and you're good to go. And let’s not forget, "Rednecks" are a kissing cousin to the "trashy" folks but usually involve overalls and guns - never a good combination. If you listen closely, will you hear the sound of banjos? It may just be in your head but you hear them; I know you do.
If I said, “Think Southern Baptist” would images of the good folks from the Bible Belt pop into your head? Does a roadtrip through Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi have you imagining all kinds of things about some of our most devout Christians? After all, aren't these the folks in their crisp white shirts and ties and the floral print dresses thumping their bibles and praising God on Sunday; even though, Saturday night the men got dressed up in those snowy white robes with the pointy hoods, as the women waved them off, to go plant a burning cross on the front yard of some unfortunate black person? Can't you just hear them saying in that slow, sinister southern drawl from the shadows outside the firelight – “We don't want your kind in our town so maybe it'd be best if you just move on away from here”? Now don't that just curl your toes? Of course that's what they all sound like, right? Obviously, you can't miss it; so, be sure to listen for it the next time you're on vacation down south and you stop for gas after dark.
Only a very small percentage of our population is anything like what I've portrayed above but Hollywood and the mainstream media persist in displaying those derogatory images to us. I didn't make them up; I took what they’ve repeatedly shown us and put it into words so you could see for yourself what they do on a daily basis to influence how we think about each other. None of this even begins to cover what they do to other ethnic groups around the country; African Americans, Hispanics, Arabs, etc. We’re become so disinterested in those around us and what they’re being subjected to that we literally don’t pay any attention to the swill we’re being fed about our friends and neighbors. All because the color of their skin is darker; they practice a different religion or maybe they just didn’t have the good fortune to be born here. What’s sadder and more sinister is when the police look at someone and conjure those same images with different results in mind; they call it racial profiling. In the last year, over 600,000 people were racially profiled on the streets of New York. Many were interrogated on the spot and subjected to searches of their personal property. One was a 16 year old boy who had forgotten his house key and was looking in his own window to see if anyone else was home to let him inside. Another was a business man that was stopped almost daily on his way home from the bus stop in his neighborhood. He began taking other routes home just to avoid being harassed by police. The majority of these stops are unreported with no written record as proof that these innocent people were ever harassed by police. I wonder, has any of this gotten through to you yet? Saddest and most disturbing of all is that you probably still can’t summon up enough interest to care – until it’s your turn.
