Guilty By Association

Have you ever noticed how we tend to lump people into particular groups? It’s not a problem on its own and it’s helpful in some cases. But there is this tendency to lump people into a particular group and then fail to notice that not all in that group fit the group. Not all men are pigs. Not all women are vain. Not all white people are racist. Not all black people hate white people. Broad, sweeping examples, but it’s huge and problematic.

Here are some examples. Consider relationships.

• “All marriages are boring.”
• “All men are emotionally unavailable.”
• “All women are too emotional.”
• “Every married couple eventually falls out of love.”
• “All teenagers rebel against their parents.”

Think about generations.

• “Boomers hate change.”
• “Millennials are entitled.”
• “Gen Z can't communicate face-to-face.”
• “Young people don't want to work.”
• “Old people don't understand technology.”

A big area is religion.

• “All Christians are hypocrites.”
• “All atheists hate God.”
• “Religious people are anti-science.”
• “Churches only care about money.”
• “All Evangelicals only believe what they do because of their upbringing.”
• “Everyone who goes to church is a good person.”

Or consider work and success.

• “Rich people are greedy.”
• “Poor people are lazy.”
• “All politicians are corrupt.”
• “Business owners only care about profit.”
• “Anyone can succeed if they work hard enough.”

Out of the Air Force, I took a job as an electronics technician. On my first day, one of my new coworkers greeted me with, “I hope you’re not one of those ‘born again’ Christian types.” Strange greeting, right? I asked why.

“Oh, you know, Christians are known for the Crusades. They kill in Jesus’s name.”

I thought that was strange reasoning. So, I offered a parallel to see what he said.

“You’re married, right? She loves you? Good. So, one day I show up to work, pull out a gun, point it at you, and say, ‘I’m going to kill you.’ You say, ‘Whoa! What for??’ I say, ‘Your wife told me to.’ Now, your wife loves you and you know she’d never say that, so you call me on it. Why can you see that, based on what you know about your wife, she’d never tell someone to kill you, but if someone says, ‘I’m killing in Jesus’s name,’ you can’t see that, based on what we know about Jesus, He’d never say that?”

You see, he lumped me together with the Crusaders who called themselves “Christians” and perpetrated killing and war in the name of Christ when Christ never would have made such a command. To this coworker, all Christians are homicidal—guilty by association.

It’s a sinister lie in general. Not every American is an “ugly American.” Not every Calvinist is “restless and Reformed.” And so on.

There are reasons for groups and collections like this. They aren’t, by definition, evil. They’re even biblical (think “Jews” and “Gentiles,” for instance). I’m not suggesting they’re bad on their own. But we should always remember that people are individuals, designed by God to be individual and distinct. No two alike. We can categorize some things about people, but when it becomes a judgment, we should be very careful not to assign everyone in the group the same judgment. Individuals are made in the image of God and ought to be regarded with respect, not haphazardly judged guilty by association.