It’s time to stop judging

This archived article was written by: Katrina Wood

Judge Not!
It seems likes something you’d grow out of by the time you graduate high school, but even in college, one may find it difficult to overlook appearances and stereotypes.
I know most of you will probably think I’m a bit weird for writing this. A lot of you will probably think something along the lines of, “Don’t judge a book by its cover. This is college. That stuff doesn’t happen.” And yes, I can see where you’re coming from.
For the most part, people are accepting of one another’s differences in college. Many students realize that it’s alright if others have diverse interests and come from different walks of life, and hey, that’s awesome. It’s great to see that people, once they enter college, are willing to accept others as they are. But despite what most would like to believe, we’ve still got a ways to go before we’ve perfected the art of acceptance.
When it comes to being more accepting, I’ve compiled a few ideas everyone could apply to everyday life. Though I don’t think there’s any one secret procedure that will do the trick all on its own, I think there a few small actions people can do every day in order to improve themselves and move past appearances and stereotypes.
First, just because you accept someone doesn’t mean you agree with everything they do or believe. I’ve become friends with people whose beliefs are vastly different from my own. I’ve had the chance to grow close to people I never would have believed myself capable of talking to, and found that a majority of them are interesting and fun to be around. They offer different views and opinions I never would have considered, and more often than not, when I respect their beliefs, they turn around and do the same.
The second idea is that basing one’s entire worth on physical appearance is unfair and should stop. Not only is the concept that physical appearances confirm whether a person is good or not an idiotic notion, but it’s also an outdated belief that only boasts rude behavior and a shallow mind-set. It’s an action that makes no sense no matter which way you look at it, and one that most often ends with someone realizing they were wrong.
I’ve seen it happen plenty of times in my life. Heck, I’ve even participated in it. On numerous occasions, I’ve tried to become friends with someone solely because of their appearance and realized they weren’t worth my time. On the other side of the spectrum, I’ve ignored people who weren’t quite up to what I considered par,
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