There is a type of Stranger Danger that doesn’t involve candy.I refer to it as Stranger Danger because it occurs when people who are misinformed, uneducated or unexposed spout assumptions of other people about whom they do not know or understand. Here are three examples that I’ve heard frequently:

“Blackface isn’t racist.”

“Gay rights have nothing to do with civil rights.”

“I doubt she was raped. She was probably asking for it.”

As you may or may not know, people say stupid things.

Here is another example.

I wrote an article two years ago about a teenager named Shawn Hornbeck when he was found and returned to his family after being kidnapped for four and a half years. I said some painfully moronic things that rightfully angered many people.

I speculated that Hornbeck enjoyed the time away from his family, along with making a crude joke about the charity his parents founded. I will always regret that article as I am now the kind of person who knows it is not my place (or anyone’s place) to make half-assed assertions about a person (or people) who went through something I can’t begin to understand without having experienced it myself.

I apologize to Shawn Hornbeck that I wasn’t more mature.

Sticks and stones are nothing compared to words. We must be careful of what we say, especially when the subject concerns someone who has suffered or continues to suffer. It is wrong to say something should be unobjectionable to people who were subjected to slavery and who continue to struggle with systems of privilege and inequality. It is wrong to say homosexuals don’t deserve rights, that their pursuit for a family has nothing to do with civil rights, much less a document beginning with, “We the People,” instead of, “We, Most of the People.” It is wrong to say that someone who has been raped wanted or deserved the experience.

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

This is not an issue of being politically correct. This is about avoiding referring to people as if they were a plot arc in a television series.

As inventors of the library, the veggie burger and the iPod, we deserve much more credit than that. We are more than a skin color, an orientation or a gender. Leave the damaging speculation to the “American Idol” judges and Roger Ebert.

If you have an opinion about an individual or a group of people, ask yourself if your evidence is composed of stereotypes, fears, family values or shock value. Even better, ask the individual or a member of the group concerned. You may be surprised how much of an impact one conversation will have on the rest of your life. At the very least, do some research or watch a documentary.

Expression is important but communication is absolute. It is perfectly OK to make a mistake, but only if you are willing to own up to it and change your ways. In his incredible novel about mortality and magic, “One Hundred Years of Solitude,” Gabriel Garcia Marquez wrote, “One minute of reconciliation is worth more than a lifetime of friendship.

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