Labels: Not Another Word For "Unfair Stereotyping".

Although this subject has been flogged to death, and my writing will probably make as much difference as a good idea to President Bush, I feel the need to put forward my view of labels.

To start off, what is a label? And I’m not going to jump straight into the fray like most people and say it’s an unfair stereotype. No, unlike with most blogs, I will not be putting forward my personal opinion straight off the bat. To make sure I’m being as unbiased as possible, I’m going to start in using the most general meaning of “label”. This includes going to my old friend the dictionary. The Australian Oxford dictionary thinks that a label is:

1. (n) Note fixed on an object to show its nature, destination, etc.

There. No mentions of unfair stereotypes, the word “emo”, yadda, yadda, yadda. To try and be different from most labelling blogs, I am trying to keep the concept of labelling away from the recent trend of “emo”. Also, I am keeping my examples a long way away from stereotypes. Or at least, I’m trying to keep them away right until the ending paragraphs of my blog. And even then- I’m not sure if I will really include them. Anyway, right now, we’re focused on the pure idea of labels. Got that? Good.

Now, all my rambling and defining aside, labels are everywhere. To be honest, I don’t think there is anywhere in the world of humans that doesn’t have labels. Of course, maybe animals have their own labels in their own secret languages, but I wouldn’t know that and neither does modern science. But alas, that is not important. You cannot get away from labels. Why? Because they are, literally, inescapable. When you think about it, every word in the English language is a label. Wall, dog, cup, girl, boy, flower, macaroni cheese- all labels. Every word I just listed is a label that humans created. In fact, probably almost every single word in this journal is a label. We created names for everything, and that is what they are. In the animal kingdom, as far as I know of, there are no labels.

How come humans have so many labels? Simple. Humans, as a race, are very pedantic. Everything must have a name, so it can be described, catalogued and organised. We need everything to have a name so we can point to it and say: “Hey, you, hand me that ____”. Yeah… Having names for everything is also really an aid to laziness. Unlike most species, we don’t really like to do much for ourselves. I mean, look at all the labour-saving devices we have! But that’s off-topic. Simply, labels help humans to categorise things. Without them, we get confused. Imagine having no word for (insert random favourite object here, and if it is “skittles”, I will shoot you)! How confusing would that be?

Now, the point I’ve been trying to get at (in my own confusing way), is that labels are necessary. Sad, but true. We cannot escape them, unless we’re dumb, deaf and illiterate (I would say “blind”, but I’m thinking that’s just a little drastic). Also, hating them in their complete form isn’t really optional. Because, really if you hate all labels, you hate every single name for anything. And however bitter and twisted some of you may be, I doubt that’s true. So when you start preaching about the hatred of labels, pick up your dictionary and remind yourself of the real meaning of the word. Hopefully it’ll get you thinking outside of the “unfair stereotype” ditch.