It is very common in daily life to come across comments and gestures people make that hurt you or others. Some are made deliberately while others are made out of ignorance. Whether the comments and gestures are intentional or not, they hurt. They seriously affect other people’s pride, comfort, personality and ambitions. The paragraphs below recollect a number of gestures and comments that have hurt this writer as well as experiences from his friends. By writing about them in this blog I hope I can change the mentalities of those who make these comments and gestures. I also hope these paragraphs can make victims feel better. I am not going to pretend to make a list of all comments and gestures that hurt here. You are free to add some that have been left out here.
1. My best student; Fat beautiful Alice
In one of the ESL classes I teach one of my best students in English is Alice. She is a little chubby. Every time she stands to say something in class, her classmates whistle. Some oink (sound made by a pig). All in an attempt to make her understand that she is not normal, that she is fat = ugly. Sometimes Alice cries. When I think about what this little innocent girl goes through everyday I feel like to curse the society in which we live.
Yes, I do not even blame the classmates who whistle and oink at her, I blame the society, you and I reading this post perhaps, the companies we work for, the TV channels we watch, the movies we watch, the magazines we read, the actors, actresses and all other super stars we adore; who have defined beauty, success, fame, etc in these few words: Slim and tall. They have defined ugliness, failure, etc in these few words: Fat and short. How unfair!
Alice is fat, not slim. Alice is beautiful not ugly. Alice is a person, not a pig. Alice is the best ESL student I ever had. She inspired me to write this article. Now ask yourself how many times you have said things like: Fat ugly xxxxx instead of fat xxxxx or ugly xxxxx. Beautiful tall slim xxxxx instead of beautiful xxxxx, tall xxxxx or slim xxxxx. In other words, associating the adjective ‘fat’ with negative things is hurting.
We are teachers – moulders of the society. We can correct this wrong mentality and save thousands of other people like Alice from this social prejudice.
2. Commenting on the way people look
It’s an everyday comment we make. You look good today. You look beautiful in that dress. You look handsome in that suit. You look young with that haircut. etc.
Now these may look very normal comments to you. You say them to others and others say them to you almost everyday. You have just not yet met a sensitive person like my colleague in the office who instead of ‘Thank you.’ would ask you: “Do you mean I look bad on other days?” “So I usually look ugly in my other dresses!” etc. My colleague is sensitive but outspoken. Others are not. When you compliment them they may say thank you but keep the other side of their thoughts. This is one of the examples I mentioned earlier as hurting without knowing.
You can avoid this by leaving out the words ‘today’ ‘this morning’ ‘in that dress’ etc. It may help.
Here is a tip to make you think more about this: I had a boss who used to come in to the office and say to me. “mmm your desk looks very tidy today!” What message do you think he was trying to pass on to me? Watch out when people compliment you.
3. Staring at others
You see someone on the street walking towards you. The person looks different from you (height, size, skin color, age, outfit, etc.) So you start staring at the person from head to toe. You elbow the person next to you to join you in the staring exercise. Sometimes the staring is accompanied by comments in a language you are sure the person doesn’t understand. In some extreme cases you take out your camera and give a shot.
This happens on the street, on the bus, in restaurants, on the train, etc. It makes the people you stare at extremely uncomfortable even if you mean no harm.
Out of curiousity we sometimes do this. Here is a suggestion: Take a casual look at the person or better still, greet the person and have a short conversation with him / her. That will make the person feel better while you satisfy your curiousity.
Now over to you reading this article. Share with everyone else a comment or gesture that hurts you. Write your comment in the comments section.
This entry was posted
on Tuesday, December 30th, 2008 at 1:36 and is filed under Introductions.
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
Hurting comments and gestures.
It is very common in daily life to come across comments and gestures people make that hurt you or others. Some are made deliberately while others are made out of ignorance. Whether the comments and gestures are intentional or not, they hurt. They seriously affect other people’s pride, comfort, personality and ambitions. The paragraphs below recollect a number of gestures and comments that have hurt this writer as well as experiences from his friends. By writing about them in this blog I hope I can change the mentalities of those who make these comments and gestures. I also hope these paragraphs can make victims feel better. I am not going to pretend to make a list of all comments and gestures that hurt here. You are free to add some that have been left out here.
1. My best student; Fat beautiful Alice
In one of the ESL classes I teach one of my best students in English is Alice. She is a little chubby. Every time she stands to say something in class, her classmates whistle. Some oink (sound made by a pig). All in an attempt to make her understand that she is not normal, that she is fat = ugly. Sometimes Alice cries. When I think about what this little innocent girl goes through everyday I feel like to curse the society in which we live.
Yes, I do not even blame the classmates who whistle and oink at her, I blame the society, you and I reading this post perhaps, the companies we work for, the TV channels we watch, the movies we watch, the magazines we read, the actors, actresses and all other super stars we adore; who have defined beauty, success, fame, etc in these few words: Slim and tall. They have defined ugliness, failure, etc in these few words: Fat and short. How unfair!
Alice is fat, not slim. Alice is beautiful not ugly. Alice is a person, not a pig. Alice is the best ESL student I ever had. She inspired me to write this article. Now ask yourself how many times you have said things like: Fat ugly xxxxx instead of fat xxxxx or ugly xxxxx. Beautiful tall slim xxxxx instead of beautiful xxxxx, tall xxxxx or slim xxxxx. In other words, associating the adjective ‘fat’ with negative things is hurting.
We are teachers – moulders of the society. We can correct this wrong mentality and save thousands of other people like Alice from this social prejudice.
2. Commenting on the way people look
It’s an everyday comment we make. You look good today. You look beautiful in that dress. You look handsome in that suit. You look young with that haircut. etc.
Now these may look very normal comments to you. You say them to others and others say them to you almost everyday. You have just not yet met a sensitive person like my colleague in the office who instead of ‘Thank you.’ would ask you: “Do you mean I look bad on other days?” “So I usually look ugly in my other dresses!” etc. My colleague is sensitive but outspoken. Others are not. When you compliment them they may say thank you but keep the other side of their thoughts. This is one of the examples I mentioned earlier as hurting without knowing.
You can avoid this by leaving out the words ‘today’ ‘this morning’ ‘in that dress’ etc. It may help.
Here is a tip to make you think more about this: I had a boss who used to come in to the office and say to me. “mmm your desk looks very tidy today!” What message do you think he was trying to pass on to me? Watch out when people compliment you.
3. Staring at others
You see someone on the street walking towards you. The person looks different from you (height, size, skin color, age, outfit, etc.) So you start staring at the person from head to toe. You elbow the person next to you to join you in the staring exercise. Sometimes the staring is accompanied by comments in a language you are sure the person doesn’t understand. In some extreme cases you take out your camera and give a shot.
This happens on the street, on the bus, in restaurants, on the train, etc. It makes the people you stare at extremely uncomfortable even if you mean no harm.
Out of curiousity we sometimes do this. Here is a suggestion: Take a casual look at the person or better still, greet the person and have a short conversation with him / her. That will make the person feel better while you satisfy your curiousity.
Now over to you reading this article. Share with everyone else a comment or gesture that hurts you. Write your comment in the comments section.
Happy New Year 2009
Tags: Alice, beautiful, comments, fat, hurting, impolite, prejudice, slim, staring, ugly
This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 30th, 2008 at 1:36 and is filed under Introductions. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.