First Impressions

ESSAY WRITING: “First impressions and prejudices” Nowadays society places great value on first impressions. Most of us form opinions of people only by prejudgments and superficial characteristics. It is true that, sometimes, appearance and first impressions are important and tell something about people, for instance, on a date or in a job interview. However, in my view, it is essential to get to know people, and not to base our opinions on prejudices.
To begin with, appearance does not always indicate the kind of character people have. It is common for us to say that all punks are hooligans and untrustworthy, or that all hippies are irresponsible. It seems to me that is unfair to describe someone’s personality just by the way they look, or because they do not fit society stereotypes. Talking to them and knowing what they think is the best way of coming up to a conclusion about their personality.
Secondly, it is a universal belief that women are not capable of doing certain things, just because they are considered the weaker of the sexes. I firmly believe that this is a prejudice we have to eradicate from society; women and men are in equal conditions. Today, it is not rare to see women working as builders or taxi drivers and, in my opinion; they do their jobs as well as men do.
In addition, as men are considered to be superior to women for some people, it is also common to hear that Whites are more intelligent than Black ones. To my way of thinking, this is a terrible assumption, all human beings are equal, and intelligence does not depend on our skin color.
On the other hand, most people claim that first impressions do matter. They argue that when we first meet someone, just by the way we look people can evaluate us. I think that our personality is much more than that; politeness, for example, is much more important than our clothes or hair style at a first meeting, and it really describes the way we are.
On the whole, it is my view that we, as human beings, should try to change society, and avoiding prejudices is a good way to start. It is not good to judge people only by the first impression they give on us. The human race is complex and only actions reflect our personality.