TOW #23 - Things We Think We Know

In our modern world, stereotypes are the thing we say we avoid, yet exploit endlessly to our friends and colleagues.  Whether purposely or not, stereotypes define how we tend to see each other, and how we are able to justify the ways in which we classify those unfamiliar to us.  In his essay, Things We Think We Know, Chuck Klosterman discusses stereotypes, especially those that reach international lengths.  While never refuting the oppressive existence of stereotypes, Klosterman is able to bring about a call to action of sorts, after describing his visit to Germany.

While traveling around Germany, Klosterman found the inescapable presence of American stereotypes.  And not the stereotypes that Americans have about Germans, which are obviously plenty.  Instead, Klosterman focused on the stereotypes that Germans have about Americans.  The overabundance of people believing that all Americans do is watch Baywatch, since that's what Joey from Friends liked to do, was immense.  Even though this stereotype seems far fetched, the small bits of information we get are what we hold onto.  If Joey was in a German TV show and all he liked to do was watch Barney, Americans would believe that this is what Germans liked to do in their free time as well.  As humans, we tend to hold on to the pieces of information that we can make sense of, and this information is what becomes our stereotypes.  Klosterman uses his personal anecdotes from his time in Germany to describe how these stereotypes come about, and how to fight against them.

In his ending points, the author is describing how he spent time at a bar with a couple of guys from Michigan, as well as a man from Australia who was working for the king of Bahrain.  Even though all of these men gave Klosterman information about where they came from, Klosterman was only getting the tiniest sliver of what life was like in their homes.
While talking to these men in the bar, Klosterman was able to finally decipher how stereotypes come about.  They come from humans taking hold onto the smallest pieces of information they can find, and then allowing that information to become their basis of knowledge for anyone who comes from the same place.  While Klosterman could have taken all of the bits of observations he noted about Germans, he chose instead to admit that he really still didn't know anything about Germans, or Germany.  By not allowing himself to define an entire country by a few weeks of observations, Klosterman fought against our intense love of sterotypes, and the things we think we know.