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Key points
- Labeling is a shorthand method of classifying, distinguishing, and judging.
- Labels are a necessary shorthand; we can’t analyze everything.
- When labels dominate thinking and discourse, though, we don’t analyze anything.
- Labels are weapons in the current culture wars.
Humans are the naming species. We name everything we perceive and imagine, as if the universe were a vast grocery store, with all items clearly labeled. Of course, people are not grocery store items; no label can sufficiently describe a person.
We’re easily misled by labels because they’re a convenient tool for classifying, distinguishing, and judging. To be clear, they’re a necessary shorthand; we can’t analyze everything. But when they dominate thinking and discourse, we don’t analyze anything.
There are many kinds of labels, some benign, some harmful. Labels can be:
- Distinguishing (cat or dog, instead of animal)
- Expressive (lover, dolt)
- Descriptive (go-getter, liar, racist)
- Aggressive (evoking fear or shame—Nazi, terrorist, snowflake)
- Tribal signals (conservative, progressive)
- Role signals (father, mother)
- Euphemistic (collateral damage instead of killing)
Labels create an artificial certainty. If they reduce the anxiety of doubt, they also extinguish curiosity. Once we label people, groups, or things, it seems as if there’s nothing more to learn about them. If we process any additional information, we do so with confirmation bias, not to learn, but to justify the label.
Labels are always oversimplifications when used to describe people or complex ideas. Negative labels are inherently devaluing and closer to slurs than valid descriptions. A heightened risk of violence follows dehumanizing labels, such as scumbag, hater, or pervert. In all instances, labels tell us more about the people who use them than about who or what they pretend to describe.
The use of labels intensifies arguments. Sometimes we fight more about labels than behavior.
“You’re an emotional abuser.”
“I’m not an abuser, I’m an honest person. You’re the abuser.”
We employ complimentary labels to describe our own behavior and pejorative ones to describe the same behavior of others.
“We’re social justice warriors; they’re fascist rioters.”
Euphemistic labels sacrifice accuracy for solace and, in so doing, veer toward self-deception. George Carlin was famous for pointing out that we change labels to avoid discomfort. One of his examples was the World War I term, shell-shocked, which vividly described psychological reactions to warfare. The World War II term, battle fatigue, was a more comfortable and less accurate way to describe the same phenomenon. After the Vietnam War, post-traumatic stress disorder reduced the description of war’s effects to psychobabble. But even that was too uncomfortable, so it was replaced with PTSD, which describes nothing.
The Madness of Labels
Labels inflame cultural clashes, especially when stoked by various media, and may contribute to the degeneration of protests into riots. In my six decades of adulthood, I’ve seen responsible journalism become contaminated with labels. Journalistic bias used to be subtle, confined to the selection of which stories to cover and the emphasis placed on them. Now bias is apparent in the labels they employ.
Social media is replete with wanton misuse of labels. Terms like fascist and woke are used to shame, not describe systems of government or social policy. In our polarized times, they signal tribalism more than descriptive accuracy. Labels that mangle the language in the name of inclusiveness create more division, less tolerance, and more exclusionary counter-labels.
Exercise to Free Yourself From Labeling
First, recognize the intellectual shortcomings of labels. Then list the labels you regularly use, indicating which:
- Express your feelings
- Signal tribalism or group affiliation
- Evoke shame or fear
- Are euphemisms for qualities or behavior you might be ashamed of
- Express identity (Note the reductive nature of each label by listing your qualities and values excluded by it.)
Rate the descriptive accuracy of each item on your list. To do so, you must try to obviate the power of confirmation bias by deliberately considering evidence that contradicts the label.
