I am conformity. I am the norm. I follow the rules. I do not make waves. I am not deviant. When I think of my childhood and adolescence, the one thing that comes to mind is I never wanted to disappoint my Mother. My high school years were conformity to the letter, I was a cheerleader, homecoming princess and I did not bend the institutionalized rules of my Mom or the educators. I grew up in a town of 9,000 so I also felt the pressure of how I represented myself to the town. I didn’t drink because I was too afraid to get caught. I never wanted to see my name in the paper in a negative light. I was never going to be a criminal, I knew that then and I know that now. I was so busy in high school that I just didn’t have time to step out of bounds. In the Differential Association Theory, it explains that the more you associate or see criminal behavior, the more likely you are to commit that behavior. (Sutherland and Cressey 1977:75) I was never allowed to associate with kids whose parents had been involved in crime so I had no exposure to those aspects that could have influenced my criminal behavior. Labeling Theory states, “The deviant is one to who that label has successfully been applied, deviant behavior is behavior that people so label.” (Becker 1991: 39) As we discussed in class, when a positive label is associated with a person it can have a different affect than when a negative label is associated. I had the benefit of a positive label and even though it came with its set of pressures such as in Strain Theory, I chose at that time to conform and it was much easier to take the path of least resistance. In Strain Theory, conformity is defined as the “conformity to both cultural goals and institutionalized means.” (Merton 1957: 21)
For my deviant act, I chose to put “Goth” makeup on and go to my local Target store. In the area that I live in near Camas, there are rarely people who look different from the considered norm. I felt extremely uncomfortable when I arrived in the parking lot and I did not want to get out of my car. As I walked into Target, I was immediately noticed and as I approached a lady she immediately walked as far away from me as she could get. I started to feel so heavy and weighed down with emotion of how people were reacting to me. I also noticed that as I was making my way around Target shopping that the security guard started to “show up” in many of the aisles I was in. I had never experienced that in my entire life and started to feel like I was doing something criminal. Around the 15-minute mark, I experienced my most embarrassing moment when a lady shielded her child away from me in the aisle. I immediately felt ashamed of what I looked like and I was ready to escape the scrutiny. This experiment opened my eyes to what it feels like to look different than our assumed norm. I will think again before I stare a little to long at someone that looks different than me. I chanted a mantra when I went into Target that helped my bravery. I am strong. I am unique. I will hold my head high and own it. I was so emotionally exhausted when I finally sat in my car and felt extremely humbled that I do not have to experience this on a daily basis and what a disservice we cause to others that do.
Word count: 621
Reference
Merton, Robert K. 1957. Social Theory and Social Structure. The Free Press a division of Simon and Schuster Adult Publishing.
Sutherland, Edwin H and Donald R. Cressey. 1977. Criminology 9th ed. Philadelphia, PA.
Becker, Howard S. 1963. Outsiders: Studies in the Sociology of Deviance. The Free Press an imprint of Simon and Schuster.
Image 2 from Google Images, www.deviantart.com.
Image 3 from Google Images, conformity cartoons.
Amber- this is a really good blog. I really think the whole thing is awesome. I like thought that you had never had to feel deviant growing up or anything and then all of a sudden you walked into Target being deviant. I think it was a really good experience for you to do, so now you know how others feel who are labeled deviant. You can always study it, or people can tell you, but you never really know until you experience it yourself. I also liked the theories you used in part one of your blog. Good job on your blog. I liked it all. You can relate your part one of you blog to what we have been talking about in class by you were the "norm" and you never went outside that. You did not want to disappoint anyone so you stuck to the "norm" and thats what we have been talking about since day one in class! Good job!
ReplyDeleteAEmery,
ReplyDeleteAgree/Awesome
I enjoyed how you analyzed the emotional effects of stigmatization. It is shameful how certain people judge others on outward appearances alone. No doubt, these same people assigned labels to you, and as we have learned society constructs negative meanings to those labels. We are privileged that we are able to remove our deviant labels once our social experiment is finished, many others are not as lucky. Braithwaite states, "...a high level of stigmatization in the society is one of they very factors that encourages criminal subculture formation by creating populations of outcasts with no stake in conformity, no chance of self-esteem within the terms of conventional society.." (Braithwate, 35). I believe this effectively summarizes some of the emotions you felt, and it is incredible to think that many people do not have the option of ending their social experiments; they are marked for life as a felon, offender, or deviant. I enjoyed reading your thoughts.
- Steve
Works Cited:
Calhoun, T, et al. Readings in Deviant Behavior. (Braithwate) pp 35.
Hi Amber,
ReplyDeleteI really liked your idea for a deviant act and I appreciate how humbling such an experience could be. I just wanted to hear more about your analysis of the situation. I thought shame theory would have been great to analyze your deviant act although I thought the sources you sited were valid as well. Shaming theory has more to do with shaming people for crimes committed and I think that goes along with looking like a “criminal,” which I think is the fear when coming across someone that is wearing all black. Besides the underlying notion that people that wear dark clothing are probably going to be criminals, what more would we have to fear them for? That’s probably why the security guard was keeping a close eye on you—because he placed you into a category because of the way you were dressed.
Disagree/ Do Better
ReplyDeleteI really like what you wrote but I feel you could of done better. Your childhood and the relation to the differential assocation theory was interesting. I like how you tied them together but I feel that you could of pulled more fromt the reading like, "The principal part of the learning of criminal behavior occurs within intimate personal groups" (page 27).
Part 2: I loved your deviant act. I would have liked to hear more about your analyze and seen more sources to back that up. I think that being "goth" is a sterotype that is very interesting. Children dress up as "goth witches" for halloween in today's society. It's is very interesting how quickly people judge others and how your experience lead you to feel like you were a criminal.
This is a very interesting blog post.