Labeling is a bad thing.

J. Hoberman, the movie critic, in writing about There Will Be Blood said this, "Plainview is a visionary materialist and the loneliest of lone wolves, not to mention a self-invented entrepreneur and the very embodiment of D.H. Lawrence's formula for our essential national character: 'hard, stoic and a killer.' "

The part that gets my attention is the phrase 'essential national character'. I don't believe in this sort of thing. What does it mean anyway? Are most Americans 'hard, stoic and killer'? Or is it that our national or corporate leaders are that way? Are these traits more prevalent in US citizens than in citizens of, say, France? What is France's national character? Does this sort of thing only apply to countries? How about generations, genders, regional populations? Can ethnic and racial groups have essential characters? Isn't that line of thinking called racism?

Anyway, this National Character stuff is a cheap way to make your movie review sound more sophisticated, (so is quoting D.H. Lawrence), without, you know, saying anything meaningful. When I read or hear someone labeling a group, I get suspicious, thinking that the speaker is a lazy thinker, or a bigot, or is assuming that I will go along with their received wisdom.

More debatable, I suppose, than National Character is Personal Character, which I am not sure I believe in either. But I'll save that for later.