Have you ever judged a book by its cover?
I am of the opinion that everyone ever judged a book by its cover. Some might judge others unconscious, but there are enough people judging others immediately after seeing the person from head to toe. There were times people judged me wrong and times that I judges others totally wrong. Most of the time when I judge people wrong, is that I think they are very nice people. I often trust people that they are nice and kind hearted to me, but very often when they are too nice to you or to me, it can be a warning sign. It could be that they want something from you in return or they are just being fake in front of you and talking behind your back when you leave the room. Of course there were times that I judged someone by their looks and regret later after finding out they are actually kind hearted.
Once I made a post of the jobs I had in the past. I mentioned in that post that I worked at McDonalds for just an hour! I wanted to work there because it was difficult to find a job and I needed money to pay my Fashion school. So it would be more a part-time job. I worked just one hour and realised that job wasn't for me simply because the grill machine scared me. In that hour I worked with some other colleagues to be. One of my colleagues looked like this guy in the image above on the left side. He had tattoos, golden teeth, chunky necklace, big golden rings and diamond earrings, without the guns :-D. I was kinda scared of him. Which is strange for me to be scared of him because I grew up and lived in the ghetto. So I got scared and tried to avoid him. I was frying the chicken nuggets and he came to talk to me very nice and helped me like a gentleman. I wasn't good in cooking/baking/frying yet at that time, so I was very clumsy in the kitchen. I was scared of the hot oil hehehe. He was nice and not aggressive as I thought at that time. I really regretted after getting to know him, that I judged him so wrong based on how he looked.
Remember the movie Legally Blonde? Well, especially men(not all) often think when they see pretty women, that they are just good in being pretty. Especially when a woman wears make up and has her hair done. It seems, to many men, women are smart when women don't care about make up and hair and those women probably have short hair and wear glasses. Once women take good care of their appearance and has her nails done as well, they get a stamp of S-T-U-P-I-D. It's a shame men can speak/think so low about women. If that same woman would not wear any make up, hair short like a man and short nails, then men would probably judge her much smarter.
Most of the time when I judge people wrong is that I think they are very nice and that they could be my best friend. You know these people (of the same gender) who always compliments you and always want to help you with anything.
Few years ago when I was still a student, I shared a room together with another girl. I was an exchange student in Singapore NTU and shared a room with an Indonesian student from Malaysia. She was super helpful and was always nice, a bit too nice I thought. She literally wanted to help me with everything. She was even sticking a plaster on my middle toe when I had pain there. Then she suddenly became weird. She became bossy telling me that it was her room and she makes the rules. She also lets in a cat into our room which I didn't like because that cat ruined my shoes! Not that I hate cats, I love cats. She didn't care and just kept the cat inside our room and the cat ruined another pair of my shoes. That cat also almost ruined my suitcase! In the night when I was sleeping my roommate woke up, almost every night to study, and just opened and closed the door very loud, not understanding that I was sleeping. I asked her nicely if she can open and close the door silently, but she didn't say sorry or that she won't be so loud anymore. She also fed the cat in the night. The food was in a plastic bag so the bag made a lot of noise. Who is feeding a cat in the night? After telling her multiple times, it just became worser. She tried everything to ruin my night sleep and even gossiped about me to her friends, obviously bad things because they suddenly looked very angry at me.
When I was a Business student (back in Holland), I worked together on a project with a guy that seemed to be so nice. After a while I found out that he was so nice to me because he wanted me to do all the work. Later I told him that I want to continue to work alone on this project and that he could find a new project and work alone on it. I am not sure if he continued his study.
I remember very well that day when my uncle, my aunt's husband said that I am smarter than I look... That was apparently a compliment, but I am not sure if I have to see it as a compliment. He saw my sewing project and never thought I could make something like that. He wasn't and isn't the first one who thinks I am quite stupid. I can write a lot, but in real life I don't say much, except to my husband and kids. Not that I am shy, I just don't speak much unless there is an interesting topic to speak about, but I just can't talk about the weather. So maybe it is my silence or my looks that makes people think I am not that smart.
I guess it is better when people underestimate you so you can surprise them, but it can be annoying when you look for a job and the people who interview you judge you already by your appearance and not taking you serious.
There are also people who judge others by their beliefs. As I mentioned before I judged in the past a guy because of his tattoos, golden teeth and diamond earrings, but I never judge people by their beliefs. I think it is sad that people do that. Someone belief or disbelief is something personal and we should never judge them. If you want to judge a person by their belief, make sure you know enough about that person to have a reason to judge her/him. I also believe that people who are judging people by their skin colour or belief, are also (indirectly) teaching their kids to be like them. These innocent kids who don't see a difference between a coloured and white person or between a believer and a disbeliever in the beginning, have a high chance to become a mini version of their parents.
Have you ever judged someone by their appearance and found out you were totally wrong about her/him? Or has someone judged you by your appearance?
I thought this post was about books and I was gonna jump and say I had judged books by their cover a lot haha.
What can I say, I dislike racist people which are judging by the way you look and it's sad that people are so ignorant and lame to be a racist.
I used to care about this a lot before, when I was in Venezuela some part of the population pay too much of attention to your looks, if you have money, whats your cellphone and stuff like that, here in Argentina they are very relaxed with that, even if your hair is messy, depending the situation they won't even notice, I like that a lot, even though I care a lot about my image, it kinda relaxes you and sets you free, so it allowed me to develop other styles.
Btw those roses on the beggining are friggin cool, is that where you write?
I also don't like racists. Especially when people are coloured like us we deal a lot with racism. A lot of people in Indonesia are also like that. They look at your watch and your shoes. or when you are western you are more special than their own people. Those roses? hahaha, that's an image of Photo Lab where you can add your own picture.
Since you told us you had a garden and prepared tasty drinks in the mourning my next guess is that you had beautiful roses everyday in your room, i like white ones, i don't know, make me feel like in the royalty hahahaha, also i friggen love orange juice in the morning.
After so many years i can recognize people that wanna show off and pretend. I do some trading with people that have rolex on their wrists but they bought them maybe 10 years later after working so hard so its kinda different.
To me, (call me crazy) i love transparent and honest people, i value that a lot, and they are also the best to do business with, they can even tell you, "im sorry i am not qualified for that" instead of damaging your business due to inexperience and say yes to everything.
Yes I have met such people. They are so nice and so respectful and always keep smiling. But what they do behind your back, make you dumbfounded! Maybe, the smiling facade they wear is just a ploy they employ to fool people! Anyway, I find it hard to hate anyone. I just wish that such people change. However, they never change, which puzzles me. Great and very informative article by the way!
Yes, there are enough crazy people here on earth. The people you have to be the most careful of are those who are wearing a mask. I think with social media now, there are even more and more of such people. Thank you!
some people are good but tough times makes them worse
That is also true.
sorry to interrupt. hi, :) . There is a project called project Venus, it explains what you just mention @blazing.
Well those are really some experience that you have been through.While I do really have to say I for myself have been in situations where I thought of wrong about the person but the result was completely different while the situation was reverse also.
While listening to the situations of your life especially the bossy room mate who sure is really annoying and the man from the Mc donalds does indeed makes realize that all that thing that we see are not true.Appearance are indeed deceiving and so are nature of people.
While if it was the post that I would have been reading 5 years ago I would not had any reaction but life has really taught me many things over the years and I have changed a lot .
While ,like the title says we should not judge by a book by its cover.
Yes, appearance is deceiving. The way we dress and our skin colour play a big role in people's mind, which shouldn't be that way.
People will be people. It's impossible not to have a first impression. It's impossible not to think something. New experiences, like seeing new people, but similarly other things like a meal, a building, a place,... we always think something. The important aspect is indeed not to judge and to realize you need enough information to judge. A meal might be very tasty but once they tell you the farmer is not being paid fair for the vegetables that might change your opinion. The same goes for people. Also, there's nothing wrong with changing opinions. But as you say it is more important to be aware of what your opinion is based on before drawing conclusions of it and taking actions based on them. Nice writing!
Maybe it is impossible to have a first impression, as long we don't go so far and try to get to know the people first to confirm our impression. Thank you @jefpatat :-)
It has unfortunately become human nature to subconsciously judge people by their looks, and some of us try to put in an effort to do it. It has taken us decades to devolve to such a level, so it will take time to get rid of such an unnecessary way of judging people. But yes, it stands true that you should not judge a book by its cover.
I am not sure if it's getting better.... It looks to me its getting worser. Maybe before social media there was a time it was a good time, but since social media it feels like we go back to the bad time...(apartheid)
certainly, and i believe in the times of social media like instagram, facebook people are being more judgmental and there is just an illusion of happiness when in fact true facets of people's lives is being hidden under brightly colored photos... that is why i find a place like steemit a welcome change because somehow the people here are nicer.. well, most... and i'm not sure if the whole society can change, but some people are definitely trying to bring about a change..
That is why I stopped with Facebook. I still have a facebook account, just to check pictures of my family. but most of the time I see people showing off what they have.
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each one of us has his own list of misjudged people i guess it’s due to our humain nature we use our eyes first and We receive only an appearance and some movments and reflexes that we muy analyze it later .the other thing we use is our heart and both of these tools can misguid us .
Yeah there was this guy I met some years ago he had a very mean appearance and then I just judged him a bad guy then coincidentally we got grouped together for an assignment and then I got to know him and since then we have been really close friends
Wow! haha, that is something! At last it went good with the two of you :-). Did you tell him how you thought about him in the beginning?
Actually I did but he just laughed about it
Amazing post sir
Sir? Really?
hahahaha, hard to believe.