Was I a girl when I was a baby?

That was the question posed by my 6 years old son few years back whilst flicking through old photos in my phone.

My wife and I were speechless and did not know how to process or respond to the question? After what seemed like a million hours, my wife managed to ask "What makes you think that you were a girl?"

"Because I am wearing pink color shirt and shorts in that photo".

That was a moment of realization, for a six year old growing up amidst shopping malls, television, YouTube and smart phone. Gender is fluid but the colour association with gender is fixed.

The unconscious bias and the stereotype gets programmed by external world very early in the life. Just a generation ago, I was raised in India at a time when there was no such concept as pink is for girls and blue is for boys.

Our brain is the most sophisticated pattern matching machine, new neural pathways are formed everyday based on what you see and observe and forms the basis of intuitive, fast and automatic decisions and judgement.

It requires lot of conscious effort everyday to switch the brain into slow and analytical mode to fight against unconscious bias.

So, next time when your brain races to form a judgement about a candidate or someone, remember to slow down and give everyone a fair chance.

I highly recommend reading "Thinking, fast and slow" by Daniel Kahneman .

Take it easy until next time.

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