Person One:

  1. This person I assumed was a homeless person in the streets of downtown person. They were wearing worn, dirty clothes with rips and holes. His face was wrinkled and cheeks were sunken in with a gray beard growing. He was wearing a hat, but no shoes. He was holding a sign that said “Anything helps. God Bless” and holding a paper cup with crumpled bills and change in it.
  2. It is hard to judge the values and beliefs of a person like this because I was so distracted by their dirty clothing and my empathy for them. I will never know if they are a good person, if they were once successful, or what their political beliefs are. When I did community service at a downtown chapel in Portland, we held a community coffee and bagel event which gave students the opportunity to socialize with some of the local homeless members. Many of these people were not weird. They had just had some very unfortunate circumstantial things happen to them that they were not able to support themselves. Many of them had interesting lives before they became homeless. Now, some of them had mental disorders which prevented them from working and earning a living for themselves. My point is, it is hard to judge people like this for their values and beliefs because they are not dressing themselves to show their style, they are dressing themselves to stay warm, protected, and alive.
  3. I made the assumption that the man was old, white, male, bad health, and not very good emotional condition.
  4. These assumptions say that I believe that all homeless people probably have bad health and are not in very good emotional condition. I guess it’s possible they might have surprisingly good emotional conditions given the circumstances, but their health is probably very bad because of lack of resources for good hygiene.

Person Two:

  1. I saw a middle aged woman with bleach blonde hair, wearing a Luis Vuitton hand bag, designer brand denim jeans, and big sunglasses. She was carrying a small fluffy dog inside another bag and walking into the department store Nordstrom.
  2. I thought that this woman’s values and beliefs were most likely very superficial. She seemed to be one of those people who have a lot of money and choose to flaunt it and show off their worth. She seemed to be doing this with wearing very expensive clothing and pet. She didn’t have any tattoos or piercings from what I noticed and she didn’t seem like the kind of person who would have any or support other people who had them. She seemed very proper.
  3. I assumed that she was around 50 years old, female, white, raised in a wealthy family, good health, and probably not a very good emotional condition. I think that usually people with a lot of money have enough resources to stay relatively healthy but they don’t have very good emotional condition. I think that people who choose to flaunt their money in their clothes or what they own tend to be compensating for some kind of unhappiness.
  4. I think that these assumptions say that I can be very judgmental, but going to a private high school with a lot of wealthy people has shaped how I view other wealthy people. I also value people who are humble and I don’t believe it is good to flaunt your money. I think it makes people look superficial.

Person Three:

  1. I saw a young man waiting for the max train in downtown Portland. He had a buzz haircut, and he was wearing a fitted solid color t-shirt, jeans, and tennis shoes. He had a tattoo sleeves covering both of his arms, and part of a tattoo on the back his neck showing above his shirt. He didn’t appear to have any piercings. He was dressed as an “average guy.”
  2. I thought the man’s values and beliefs were hard to read and place. Clearly he had no problem with tattoos so he probably believed in body art as a form of expression. He seemed very fit, so he probably takes his personal health seriously. Other than that, I couldn’t place anything else.
  3. I assumed that the man was about 27, white, male, probably a middle-class cultural background probably grew up in America. He seemed fit, so I assumed he was healthy. I also assumed that he had no out of the ordinary emotional issues and relatively happy by his facial expression.
  4. These assumptions say that I believe that a person can have a lot of tattoos and be normal, even though there is a part of me that was surprised and I expected a person with that many tattoos to be wearing all black and black lipstick or something. But I don’t believe there’s anything wrong with tattoos. I think it is a person’s choice whatever they want to put on their body. I may not want to have a lot of piercings and tattoos myself but I wouldn’t not hire someone because their tattoos if I was an employer.