Stereotyping People

Author’s Note: Reading this essay you will see why I believe that the author of this book had stereotyping as the theme of the book.

            Growing up as a Greaser and living among the Socs, while being stereotyped based upon what has happened to the others in your group, is something most of the Greasers grow up with. In the book The Outsiders, by S.E. Hinton, Ponyboy is a Greaser who, in my eyes, shouldn’t have to grow up with people stereotyping him just because of the looks or actions of his group. In reality the other members of his group are nothing like him.

            Ponyboy is probably the most intelligent Greaser. He likes to read, he knows right from wrong (most of the time), and he is in classes with only the Socs. Strangely, Ponyboy stereotypes the Socs in the beginning of the story after the watching the movies with Johnny, Marcia, and Cherry. Ponyboy and Cherry were talking and he was saying how he thinks all Socs are snobs. It turns out, he was wrong about the Socs because Randy, in the end, turns out to understand what some Greasers have to live with. Randy had to go through a lot in order to realize people are a lot like each other.

            This story reminds me of another book called He’s with Me, by Tamara Summers. There is a girl named Lexie who, in the beginning, somewhat stereotypes Bree’s friend Sally. The only reason why she stereotypes is because she is friends with Bree. Lexie then realizes that Sally was mistreated and misjudged the whole time. She was being pushed around by Bree all the time and always had to sacrifice whatever Bree wanted, just so Bree could get her way.

            Reading these two books made me now think twice about stereotyping people. For now on, I am going to get to know the person before I say anything about them. This is something everyone should do. Just so everyone would be able to get a chance. Unlike how this world is.