Others’ fixed labels of us are an unrealizable limit on our situation

Evidence

In particular the permanence of place and environment, of the judgments passed on us by our fellowmen, of our past—all shape a degraded image of our perseverance. While I am temporalizing myself, I am always French, a civil servant or a proletarian for others. This unrealizable has the character of an invariable limit for my situation. — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, 1283

Categorization

• XREF: ‘French, a civil servant or a proletarian for others’ directly anticipates Beauvoir’s analysis of woman as socially granted essence. — connects to: Merely labeling people with arbitrary categories enables essentialist explanations; Identities are reinforced by outsider-given labels; People inevitably perceive others through generalization because full individual knowledge is impossible — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 173 (+3 more)
• ADDENDUM: The ‘invariable limit for my situation’ that arises from others’ judgments connects to themes in the immodesty article about identity being externally assigned.

Broader Connections

• Merely labeling people with arbitrary categories enables essentialist explanations #expands (0.85)
• Identities are reinforced by outsider-given labels #corroborates (0.80)
• Defining people by one identity aspect fragments and weakens them #expands (0.80) — Jenny Odell, How to Do Nothing, 512
• The mere label of a target group becomes a mandate to distort them #corroborates (0.80) — Theodor W. Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Dialectic of Enlightenment, 145
• People inevitably perceive others through generalization because full individual knowledge is impossible #expands (0.75) — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 173
• Humans cannot be described statically because humanity is constantly in the making #corroborates (0.72) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 103