issue208 【AWB小组】18th作业

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“The way people look, dress, and act reveals their attitudes and interests. You can tell much avout a society’s ideas and values by observing the appearance and behavior of its people.”
       
This statement generalizes unfairly that the way people look, dress, and act reveals their attitudes and a society's values. I concede that in certain aspects people’s appearance and behaviors are accurate indicators of their attitudes and society’s values, yet in other aspects they are not.

Generally, people’s extrinsic appearance and behaviors mirror their attitudes and interests. While White collar workers usually dress formally during their work time, which shows their upright and serious attitude towards work, artists are more than likely found dressing in a free style, oftentimes in an exotic way that reflects their emphasis on liberty. Football fans can often be recognized wearing their favorite teams’ jersey, shouting at the referee and cheering loudly as a symbol of support. While a dancer who received a long period of stature training and musical edification may act more elegantly than common people, leaving others an impression that he or she must own a proclivity for dancing. Again, the great philosopher Kant adds much credence to the point. It is said that Kant kept his life so strictly scheduled that people living in his town could even check their watch when they saw Kant walking on street in every afternoon at exactly the same time. From this anecdote we could easily catch a glimpse of Kant’s attitude towards his academic career, which is always serious and critical.

To some degree, people’s appearance and performance do demonstrate the ideas and values of a society. For instance, Muslin people usually wear plain, simple robes and head coverings, revealing the sincere fear and respect of Allah as well as the modesty espoused by Muslin society. On the contrary, the popularity of casual wear in the U.S., jeans and T-shirts as representatives, serves evidence for the free will that American society cherishes. A society of people who act in a hateful manner toward others apparently lays a low value on respect and tolerance of other people's opinions and beliefs, while a society whose members behave in a genteel and civil manner toward one another is one which values human dignity highly.

However, the exterior images and behaviors merely present us limited outward information, which may fail to reveal people’s thoughts and interests, nor do they necessarily tell us about the opinions and values of a society. For one thing, people’s real interests and inner feelings may be disguised by their appearances or actions. Albert Einstein serves as a telling illustration in this point. Careless of his dress and daily trivia, Einstein hold a precise and persistent attitude towards science study and research, which led his fame as one of the greatest scientist in the world. For another thing, we cannot perceive a society’s value solely relying on people extrinsic appearance and behaviors either. In an immigrant country where diverse ethnic groups and cultures coexist, like in America or Australia, people from different culture backgrounds may dress and behave totally unlike, therefore, one can hardly learn much about the core values that country truly hold by merely observing the way people dress or behave. Further, as globalization sweeps the world, more shared views on how to dress or behave are penetrating through many societies, consequently, myriads of distinct culture ideas and values become vague and hard to detect. Thus, to identify the unique values of a society is not simply to observe the way people dress or behave; it requires much more. Studies on the religion, legislations, and history of a society are of necessity to have an insight upon a society.

In sum, the assertion has some merits yet it amounts to an incomplete generalization. Though people's appearance and behaviors do reflect their habits and views and the values of a society to certain degree, they cannot always inform us about the real interests people have and the true values of a society.