Arts and Humanities

Art and Humanities: 20th Century and Beyond

Unit 2

July 19, 2010

When openly gay eighth-grader Lawrence King went to school on February 13, 2008, he had no idea that he wouldn’t return home at the end of the day. King had been bullied for a long time before a classmate, a 14-year old boy named Brandon McInerney, shot him in the head in a classroom full of students. The suburban California community of Oxnard was shocked that something like this could happen, but throughout history many people groups have been hurt by stereotypes. Hitler created his own stereotypes about Jewish people, and because the German people believed his propaganda, millions of innocent Jewish people were killed. With stereotypes, it’s not only the beliefs that hurt people, it’s the actions people take when they stereotype that can cause the most damage. For Lawrence King, the damage was permanent.

Just a handful of commonly held stereotypes about gays include: the idea that gay people want everyone else to have their same sexual orientation, if you’re friends with someone who’s gay you’ll become gay, and gay people will give you AIDS. In Lawrence King's schoolyard, as well in life, these stereotypes are perpetuated through learned behavior. Children learn their beliefs from those closest to them during their formative years, such as parents and siblings, and then they share those beliefs with their friends in school. Stereotypes are transmitted through parental influence, then through peer discussion and pressure, until they’re turned into action. It’s difficult to determine who or what is responsible for the perpetuation of stereotypes, as most beliefs can be traced back generations. What begins as a bad experience for one person ends in a shared family belief. However, it’s not only parental influence and shared familial beliefs that create a stereotype.

The media around us-- the internet, books, radio, print, and television-- influence our beliefs about stereotypes. It's...