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Tagged for life

Spare a profound thought before labelling others with negative traits for it might leave a lasting impact

Photo: K.V. Srinivasan

Foot loose and fancy free Labelling can saddle up freedom when it is most needed

Labels stick and labels suck. They are as insidious as insinuating, while at times they tether and trap. They oversimplify and are simplistic; they are indelible and unreliable and they can psychologically maim and destroy.

They leave emotional wounds that fester and yet, people wallow in them and create them; Companies spend fortunes on them to reinforce and to influence consumer behaviour. One must have often heard about common traits like annoying, abnormal, impractical, crude, disloyal, extremist, irreverent, rude, unfit, foolish, racist, fundamentalist, biased, prejudiced, incompetent and reckless.

A label gets its life in the course of time and it also gets out of control of those who coined them in the first place.

Youngsters are the worst victims of this classification exercise. “When people call me foolish, I get angry because I am not one. They should understand us before passing a judgment," says G. Sri Kanya, a primary school student. Each of the affected lot has a story to tell. Judgment calls during childhood can have devastating effect, leaving terrible emotional debris. “I was called a soft girl for so long by so many people that I started believing it. I was behaving like one and in the process, I was becoming a shell with all its real stuff scooped out,” says K. Durga, a B.Sc. student. Recounting the emotional hell he passed through, Y. Lakshmi Narayana, in his first year of diploma (mechanical) says: “I was labelled ‘good for nothing’ and a coward. It started affecting me and disturbed me a lot.”

Well aware what the burden of being labelled can mean, Durga says once a person is branded without the knowledge of facts, his or her confidence is severely dented, education goes haywire and he withdraws into a shell. It also affects communication skills and social participation becomes nil. Encouragement by teachers and pep talk by buddies can, however, help a great deal in coming out of the trauma.

After passing out of school, while many youngsters feel the urge to find an inner sanctuary in the world of flux, there are others who make use of the tagging exercise to add a zing to the college life.

“There is an affectionate side to it as well. We ‘brand’ some of our friends just for the heck of it. Such tiny pleasures can add spice to life and there are no hard feelings involved in the fun game,” chirps Sangeeta.

Attitude is important to handle a difficult situation. In the event of a failure, many youngsters begin to harbour guilt for not being able to measure up to the expectations of their elders and find it difficult to digest their critical comments.

A failure, after all, is not a question of life and death. We must learn to play down such disappointments reminding ourselves that there is life beyond all failures,” insists L. Naveen, a college student. Most agree on the point that such an analysis tells more about the analyser rather than about the analysed.

The least an analyser can do is to study the way a person thinks, his habits, beliefs and culture. Lakshmi Narayana has a lucid option to offer: “We must hit at the root of the problem. Teenagers feel that the pace of their movement is not proportionate to the level of understanding of the people around them. All they seek is empathy and acceptance.”

G.B.S.N.P. VARMA

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