One single story can shape a person’s beliefs on a person, place, or event. Everyone knows the dangers of stereotyping. Stereotyping can be very harmful, and demeaning. One single story can create these stereotypes. For example, Chimimanda Adichie used the example that someone read that all men in Nigeria beat their wives, so it must be true that the youth in America are all murderers as shown in American Psycho. She also mentioned that the single story does not tell the whole story, so instead of starting with the British forcing the Native Americans out, start with the Native Americans crafting their arrowheads. In my community back home, the first thing that stands out to me and puts the wrong image into the minds of others is that Detroit is a terrible, and dangerous place. While there is some truth behind Detroit’s image, like any single story, it is not the whole picture. When I tell people here in Blacksburg that I am from the Detroit area, I can see their eyes get wide, and some have asked me how bad it is there. Just like any other major American city, there is crime, but this does not mean that crime runs through every block and corner. The single story that people hear automatically make people think that I live in the ghetto, while in reality, I live twenty-five minutes from Detroit in the safe confines of the suburbs. My community is a very safe place to live, and I do not have to worry about my safety, or my family’s safety every night that I go to sleep. Most people in my subdivision usually did not even lock their doors. People who have not been to Detroit can only imagine the shootings, stabbings, and robberies that are broadcasted through the media, because the media tends to only report the bad things, and not the positive things. In reality, Downtown Detroit is a very safe place where you do not have to constantly look over your shoulder. I frequently go to the Detroit Tigers baseball games downtown, and have a great time with no fear. I have played baseball with a few kids who actually did live in the dangerous areas of Detroit, yet, you cannot have known a nicer human being. One single story cannot possibly show the whole picture, and the small details. Unless you are a part of the community itself, you cannot know exactly what is going on, or the kinds of people, and atmosphere a community is made up of. I do not believe that even many stories can do a community justice of what it is really like.