In an ideal world labels may not be needed but in the real world human beings like to categorize maybe even need to in order to develop mental shortcuts used in social interactions. Its why one of the first things that comes up in a new encounter is what do you do? Its a way to categorize or label and individual.

When it comes to people, labels shouldn't really matter but we like to be able to categorise and pigeon-hole others to help us understand them better and work out how we relate to them. The challenge with labels are the biases and assumptions they carry, and also that many are used perjoratively. We can't live without labels but as long as we understand that they are not black and white when it comes to people, we can start to see beyond them and appreciate people are multi-faceted with lots of different, and sometimes even contradictory dimensions. Do labels matter? I think they can be useful but no, I don't think they matter. People matter, not labels.

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