"Stereotype," noun: a simplified and standardized conception or image invested with special meaning and held in common by members of a group.
_ Dictionary.com
Stereotypes are ugly _ there's no getting around that. In high school, if there's one thing that's completely unavoidable, it's claiming some kind of stereotype for yourself.
If you're active in sports, people generally think you're unintelligent.
If you happen to get great grades, you're automatically labeled as a geek.
On Wednesday, Nov. 4, my school, Afton High School, hosted the annual District 8 and District 9 Conference of the New York State Council on Leadership and Student Activities.
In short, the school hosted a meeting of about a dozen high school student governments.
Fortunately enough, Afton's President, Erin Daly, and I were chosen to run an activity titled, "Beating Stereotypes."
"Erin and I are here to teach you all ways to beat stereotypes," I started out, preaching to a crowd of about 20 high school students. "The idea is that you'll take these ideas back to your school, and hopefully use them to beat stereotypes in your high school."
By this time, most of the 20 kids seemed uninterested. Some were there to be out of school for the day, while some were there just because their student government had sent them.
I looked around the room, and saw 20 kids who I knew wouldn't care if I taught them to "beat stereotypes" or not. So, I walked over, closed, and locked the door to the small room we were all in, making sure no adults were within ear shot.
Then, I opened my mouth:
"Look, I'm going to be honest with you. This is a complete waste of my time, and it's a complete waste of yours.
"We all know here that stereotypes are never going to disappear in high school _ that's just the way things are.
"We all form our little cliques ... don't you see it? We all flock to people who share our interests, and we like it that way. It's only natural to mesh with people who act like you."
At this point, I referred to the white board behind me. We had written down different stereotypical groups, such as "Jock" or "Gay" and given qualities to each.
"These are the groups you've identified that are present in your school. Jocks are dumb; geeks are awkward; Jewish people are cheap ... these are all stereotypes you've seen. But you have you looked at these qualities and appreciated them?
"The truth is, stereotyping isn't bad; it's not bad at all. All of these qualities that you've pointed out _ dumb, awkward, cheap _ where would we be without them? This is how we characterize people.
It's how we fit people into their niches in life.
"Without those qualities, we wouldn't have these cliques, and without the cliques we wouldn't have stereotypes. There would be no diversity, and we would enter into a boring society where there's no difference in anything we do."
By now, I had gotten their attention. I decided to go further.
"Because, you see, after high school is college, for most. The stereotypes continue there, and then we graduate. Suddenly we're out in the working world. Have you ever noticed the stark similarities between all adults? They all have this quality about them _ something that separates them from us.
"See, the truth is, that out in the working world, you have to beat your own stereotype in order to advance. You might have to take on the ambition of a jock, and the smarts of a geek, and the emotion of an `emo kid' to meet some kind of goal that you've been assigned to go for. This way, you create your own person, and you actually do beat stereotypes.
"Take our very own president, Barack Obama. Did you know President Obama was the first African-American president of the Harvard Law Review? Qualities of a geek, right? But, did you also know the president enjoys hip-hop music, and basketball? These, we can identify with the `Jock' and `African-American' stereotypes we have written down.
"What I'm trying to tell you, to be completely honest, is that there's no use in trying to solve the problem now _ it will resolve itself in most cases. Realistically, we may all seem completely different now, but we're all going to end up aged, and in diapers, probably in some nursing home. Then, how different will we be from each other?"
I was satisfied, at that point, at least. I don't really think I said it to inspire them, or to teach them. I think I just said everything to say it. If they carry it on to someone else, it will be all the better.
The lesson to be learned here is that, although stereotypes do exist, and they can be completely ridiculous, they are what they are. They are the qualities about a certain brand of people that keeps that brand separate from others. Some will argue that it would be most beneficial if we just eliminated brand in general.
I disagree. We are who we are, and that cannot change.
Without our cliques, we're all just labeled as people. One of my friends once told me, "Labels are for soup cans." Well, I'm one to say that labels are not only for soup cans. Labels are what distinguish us from everyone else, and that's what helps us stand out as teens.
Real leaders are the ones who aren't afraid to accept labels, as long as they stand by them and defend them with a passion. Labels can do one of two things: Give one strength, or give one weakness. Which way do labels affect you? You decide.
Dan Clark is a senior at Afton Central School.
