Generalizations and Stereotyping

I received an interesting comment on the entry Why the French don’t drink a lot of water during meals (and why you shouldn’t either) that I thought was worthy of a blog entry in itself:

it is considered polite (politically correct?)to qualify one’s statements. So generalizing by saying that Americans do this or that, is considered rude. What is now being done is to say that “In my family we do this…” or people compare and contrast the experiences under discussions.

This comment made me think (and rethink) my blog. On one hand it is true that everyone is different and if I make a statement about the French or Americans, it’s sure that there exists at least one person in the group for which my statement will be false. So should I stop generalizing the French and the Americans?

Let’s take the experience from a friend of mine, one of my best friends in college. She came to Paris on vacation shortly after I moved here. When we finally got together, she told me how rude the French were and how she didn’t like it here. It all started with a rude guy on the plane, then the immigration lines (the French are notorious for cutting lines.. oops!), and it didn’t stop. I won’t repeat all the details, not because I don’t want to discourage anyone from visiting Paris (I think everyone should experience it at least once) but because I just don’t remember them all. Well I remember she got caught up in the techno parade but that’s about it. Her view of France was formed from those few unpleasant experiences. And she later said she’d only come back to Paris for our wedding. We did her a big favor and got married in the US.

So while she was hating Paris and the French, at the same time I was loving it! I find that quite interesting. Because our views are all shaped by our beliefs and our own unique experiences. And that’s what makes generalizing & stereotyping so dangerous yet at the same time so fascinating. My father has never visited me here in France, to his defense he hasn’t ever left the US except to see the Niagara Falls from the Canadian side. My mom made the trip once and I don’t think anyone could talk her into coming back. So I tried to get my dad to come for years and then recently, after my wife gave me a wake-up call, I realized that he wouldn’t like it here. So I gave him the complete picture and told him about all the things I had previously overlooked: the pollution, crowds, people pushing and shoving to get a seat on the metro, all the dog poop, the cigarette smoke, etc. So later he decided he wasn’t going to come. I asked him why and he said that he asked several friends about it and they all said that the French were rude and “the way they treat ya over there” etc. Generalization? Stereotype? Or reality? And who’s reality?

So back to the original comment, this blog is how I view France and the French. And it’s how I view the Americans. And I’ll tell you a little secret, the way I view Americans has totally changed during the 6 years that I’ve lived here! So my point in all this is that this blog is a generalization. I will be stereotyping. And that’s what, in my opinion, is what makes it interesting. Many of my readers are French. Obviously they know what it’s like in France, that’s not why they come here. They come because they want to read about every day life from an American’s point of view.

So in closing, take everything here as just one point of view. Make up your mind for yourself, preferably based on your own experiences and not everyone else’s. And this goes for the French too, who love to generalize about Americans.