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:

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........

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