Profiling is both good and bad

The word, “profiling,” has a bad connotation in the US that is torn by conflicts due to issues of race, gender, reproductive rights, politics, ideology, etc.

There in that supposed bastion of freedom and democracy, profiling has meant that a person or a sector is stereotyped, labeled, and put in a box. It simply means people are not respected for who and how they are.

If profiling only means that, it should be considered bad. It is discriminatory and goes against the basic tenets of Christian belief that despite all our differences, we are all equal because we are all brothers and sisters and form one family of humanity meant to love one another.

But there is a good profiling also. And it is the kind that we do when we want to understand better a person or sector who share similar qualities, like sex, religion, age, generation, political affiliation, economic class, culture, lifestyle, preferences, etc.

Profiling is good if used as a tool to understand a certain group of people. It doesn’t mean everyone in that group or sector is the same in every categorization.

It acknowledges individual and personal differences while recognizing that everyone shares a certain quality. It knows that equality doesn’t mean uniformity.

For me, good profiling is useful especially when giving a means of formation or when I preach. When I get confident I have a good profile of the people I will address in some activity, I feel I can be more specific and proper in what I need to say. I stay away from simply mouthing mother statements and generic platitudes.

There are observable differences among the different generations; Baby Boomers, Generation X, Generation Y, Generation Z, and the so-called millennials. It would be good to take note of these differences and act accordingly.

As long as profiling is simply used as some guide without stereotyping people, then it is good. That is why we should always take note of the distinctive characteristics of different groups and sectors, without indiscriminatingly assuming these characteristics when dealing with these classes. We should also be attentive to individual and personal differences.

Life is a dynamic process, and we should not think our profiling is a static affair. It will always be an ongoing affair, and will always need updating, modification, and revision.

What is important is that we sharpen our skill of observation, taking note as promptly as possible of the new developments. The motive of all this should be to help people, not for gossiping and faultfinding.

We have to be clear about our motives for profiling and specific about the motive of helping people, because there are many ways of helping people and our idea of helping may not be altogether good or right because it can be tainted with self-interest.

To truly help people is to help them get closer to God. Short of this motive, we can suspect that our motivation is not pure. When the motive is pure, no difficulty can stop our effort to help. And our effort at profiling would be exempted of self-serving motives.