Stereotyping In The Key Of Satire

Working in the food industry creates an internal dilemma that is often masked gracefully with a painful smile: quality customer service is demanded due to the “customer is always right” mentality, and although it may be a slippery slope, you’re expected keep yourself from sliding down it while simultaneously treating each customer with the utmost respect regardless of their disposition. The perils of fabricating emotions is a potent poison that slowly affects the nervous system––ultimately creating a disdain towards humanity. The troubling thing is that there is no cure. The symptoms of this disease can merely be suppressed by a bi-weekly dose of a very weak medicine commonly known as a minimum wage paycheck. 

All of that being said, let’s dismiss the emotional fabrications and be real for a few minutes. If you were to ask me how many times I stereotype a day, I would refer you to the number of transactions I make during a shift at my restaurant of employment… and there you would find my answer. Maybe I’m a terrible person, or maybe people are just terrible and they’re starting to take their toll on me––but both are beside the point. The importance of this realization is that stereotyping other people is one of the easiest things to do. Every time a new customer walks up to the cash register, the synapses in my brain fire faster than they can hand me their form of payment. Before I even swipe their credit card, I’m convinced that I've figured out their whole life… “Look at this Lincoln Park power mom spending all of her husbands money. The most interaction she’s probably ever had with her kids was when they were in the womb. Oh you want me to hurry up your order so you’re not late to Pilates? Suuuuure thing princess.” Yet, when we were asked to create stereotypes in class for the groups that we personally relate to, I was convinced that none were applicable to me! Am I an egotistical bastard suffering from grandiose delusions? Or maybe I am so blessed as to have an existence that transcends stereotypes (yep, that definitely sounds like something an egotistical bastard would say) but the truth of the matter is that it certainly isn’t easy to view yourself thru the lens of a stereotype.

So why view other people in a manner that we wouldn’t want for ourselves? Yes, maybe I stereotype a lot––I’m sure we’re all guilty of it––but what I failed to mention is that for as often as I view someone thru the obscured perception of stereotypes, I equally make an effort to shatter that lens and attempt to see them for who they really are. And the beautiful thing about it is that it (almost) always works. Whenever a customer comes in that I immediately draw conclusions about, I make a conscious decision to talk to them on a more personal level––and it usually ends up being a pleasant interaction with a fellow human being. Maybe society has taught us to stereotype, or maybe it’s just a cognitive process that evolved to help us easier sort thru information. Regardless, all that really matters is that for humanity to progress, we need to break old habits and form new ones, so let’s start with the conscious decision to break thru the barrier of stereotypes and collectively move our humanity forward.