Stereotyping

I had a neighbour with a son who always gets himself involved in gang fights. His appearance itself doesn't seems to be pleasing, with his spiked-hair and all those metal accessories which he uses to over-crowd himself. I still can imagine how scarry he looks. I seldom talk to him, nor smile at him whenever I bump into him in the neighbourhood.

I would say that even his style of speech is not good either. He uses many vulgar words and dysphemisms and hurts people terribly. I have even noticed that he does not love animals and abuse them terribly. All these traits of him has made me to hate him with all my heart. Yet, I knew it very well that he was the only person who is not well-behaved in his entire family. The rest of his family members were all polite and loving types of people and I like them for that reason.

In fact, one of their daughter was my classmate while I was in Standard 4. One day, the bad guy was arrested by police for stealing from a supermarket. While I was talking with some of my friends in class, I got to know from them that they have actually boycotted this girl, just because her brother is not a good person.

I did not really understand why they did that, but all that I know was that I pitied that girl a lot since nobody talks to her thereafter. I tried convincing them to get into normal terms with her, however nobody listened to me. The only reason that they gave was that, "He brother is a thief, a bad person, so she will be the same too. Do not befriend her."

That was so unfair. They stereotyped that this girl will be a bad person too just because her brother is one. I wonder when people will stop making SWEEPING GENERALIZATIONS like this...