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The relation between religion and ethics
The relationship between religion and ethics
Role of religion as social agent
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There are a variety of ways in which religions may function as means of social control in small scale and state type societies. The meaning of social control is “the process that, through both informal and formal mechanisms, maintain orderly social life” (Miller 2011:174). The system of social control includes, “informal social controls that exist through socialization for proper behavior, education, and peer pressure’ (Miller 2011:175). Some places may also have “codified rules about proper behavior and punishments for deviation”. An example of a micro culture that would tie in with the informal social control is the Amish and the Mennonites. The Amish and the Mennonites have “no police force or legal system; the way social order is maintained …show more content…
A norm is “an accepted standard for how people should behave that is usually unwritten and learned unconsciously through socialization”. Every society in the entire world has norms. An example of these norms are “the expectation that children should follow their parents’ advice, that people standing in line should be orderly, and that an individual should accept an offer of a handshake when meeting someone for the first time”. These are things that everybody in this world does every single day. Norms can also be broken but violating these norms would be considered rude of disrespectful. Along with these norms there are also laws. Laws are the “binding rule created through custom or official enactment that defines correct behavior and the punishment for misbehavior” (Miller 2011: 175). The system of a law is more common among state type societies. State type societies such as Los Angeles, New York, Pittsburgh, just to name a …show more content…
Having social control in a small scale society is like having a band. The reason behind that is because bands are “small close-knit groups, so disputes tend to be handled at the interpersonal level through discussion or one-on-one fights”. Certain members of the group will “act together to punish an offender through shaming and ridicule”. They can also ostracize an offending member which means that they can “force the person to leave the group” which is a common form of punishment” and they rarely use capital
As highlighted by the author, Mary Louise Adams in her article, “Excerpts from The Trouble with Normal”, ‘a norm’ “can be defined as something that is usual, typical or standardized” (Hacking, Adams, 2003). Norms are often already so established that most individuals do not realize how much they have shaped society and the people who live in it. Audrey Lord tells us that being a “White, thin, young, heterosexual, Christian, male” defines the characteristics of being “normal” and “privileged,” in which she calls “the mythical norm” (Perry, 2011). We use our sexuality, race and class as a way of giving ourselves an identity for the world to see. This identity will ultimately allow us to understand our place in the world and give
They hold us together as a culture, while separating us as unique individuals at the same time. Folkways, which are based more on custom and etiquette are the most broken of all norms. This can be explained because worst case scenario our only reprimand may be someone staring or talking about us. Mores, while a little more serious than folkways, still don’t have a very serious punishment, just maybe a little more than weird looks, double takes and bad mouthing. Mores are usually based on social morals, which can sometimes make people get a little uneasy, but not much more than that. Laws are the most serious or formal norms, with standard punishment respective to the type of law that is broken. The norm that I have chosen to discuss, in my opinion, hits a little bit of all three of these categories. I have chosen to analyze a television talk show and the guests they attract. Maury Povich, while previously known as one of the more serious talk shows with fairly reasonable guests and topics has become more of a “Jerry Springer” type of talk show. It is almost so vile that you just have to watch it kind of a show; at least that is my roommate’s excuse. Monday, March 14th, the show aired the topic “My Boyfriend Controls My Every Move.” Since Maury was straying from his almost everyday topic of “Who Is My Babies Daddy”, I decided to give it a gander. I was absolutely appalled at the things these couples were saying. There was one couple in particular that really had my undivided attention that had been married twenty some odd years. This woman was made to do everything her husband said, or she would be punished. Her duties included cleaning, cooking, shopping, grooming and washing her husban...
The thought of society today can really boggle ones mind. There is a strict set of rules put in place that everyone has to follow, as well as authority that people look up to. Depending on the society, rules can dictate the morality of the people.
Puja Mondal shared an article entitled “Social Norms: Meaning, Types and Functions of Socio Norms in Sociology” to the Your Article Library website. The article classifies norms into various different categories. There are prescriptive, proscriptive, formal, and informal types of norms. Also, the article categorizes norms relative to their importance to society (Mondal). Prescriptive norms are positive and indicate how certain people should behave in certain situations. Proscriptive norms instruct people to avoid certain activities. Formal norms are typically written down and include rules for punishment for those who violate. Informal norms are general knowledge and are not recorded. A law authorized by the government is an example of a formal norm. Informal norms include rules such as how certain people should dress or what certain people should look like. Another group of social norms that are commonly used throughout the world are the social norms regarding public behavior. These include shaking hands when one meets another person, having direct eye contact when speaking with another person, consuming alcohol in moderation, and saying please and thank you. There are also social norms regarding one’s personal behavior. These include showering or bathing, brushing hair, brushing teeth, and offering food or
Picture this, in the late sixteenth century a small group of individuals led by Jakob Ammann broke away from the Swiss Mennonites (as stated in Amish 101 - Amish Beliefs, Culture & Lifestyle, By Albrecht Powell) and traveled thousands of miles from Europe to America to start their own communities and practice their own religion. Sounds kind of scary moving that far away from home, but that small group of Anabaptist's was more than ready for the long journey that awaited them. The reason they broke away was mainly because of the lack of punishment also known as shunning, this is when a member is disowned by the family and the members in the community because of extreme disobedience. This small group is now known worldwide by 'The Amish'.
norms are those that are highly important to either most members in a society or
While breaking the three social norms there was one feeling that I felt was mutual throughout. Breaking those norms made me felt extremely out of place and rude. They made me feel that way because I knew what I was doing wasn 't socially right and people would get mad or be rude to me with their reactions. For the most part throughout my experiment, most people reacted the way I thought they would. You could tell that most people felt awkward or uncomfortable while I was breaking the norm. I faced a couple of difficulties through my assignment when it came to violating the social norms. While trying to break the movie theater norm, it was difficult for me to pick movies with different variety of people and movies that were a little older so less people would be attending them. I also had a little trouble when it came to answering the phone and waiting for the other person to talk first. The problem with this one was that I had to wait for people to actually call me which doesn 't happen that often in this day and age anymore. To conclude, these social norms forced people to be in uncomfortable situations and make a decision as to how they would react to
Back in my high school days, a friend of mine asked me a simple question which shut down my thought process completely. The question was, ‘What is stopping us from punching the next person that says something?’ Paused for a while looking around the class for a logical answer. After several blinks off to space I responded values. The answer of values literally came out of the blue. For a well educated guess I was not too far off. Politically speaking norms are the reason we chose whether to do something or not, with a combination of values of course. Norms are defined as shared rules of conduct that specify what people ought or ought not do in specific settings. Everyday people violate many norms both knowingly and unknowingly. For example:
Society needs norms. Norms are unwritten rules that make life predictable. We have been trained to know these rules and what society recognizes as acceptable and unacceptable behaviors (Remle, Functionalism, 2016). When we act in an unexpected way, one of these norms is violated, society reacts, and sanctions are imposed. These sanctions can be positive or negative, formal or informal (Remle, Labeling Deviance, 2016).
One common characteristic among societies is punishments if you break the law. Societies have laws and punishments if you break the law to keep control and order of everyone in the area of that society. However,
A decrease in public control has to happen in order to increase social organization within the community. According to Groves (1989), poorer communities have higher petty crime rates due to higher police concentration (p. 776). Groves (1989) also states that the community type changes the actions taken by police (p. 776). In poorer communities, police are more likely to make an arrest, no matter the type of crime committed (Groves, 1989, p. 776). It is easy to conclude that this change in policing causes distrust of the police across the community. The distrust then leads to more social
A norm is a widely shared view of what is acceptable or unacceptable in a cultural setting. Each norm comes with it’s own sanctions, positive or negative The norm I chose to break was to ask permission to do anything before I do it. I chose this due to the fact that I believed it was interesting and a complete difference from my headstrong personality. This is an informal norm, as there is no written rule saying I must ask permission for anything, even though it is the polite to do so.
Norms are a part of everyday life. Without norms the world would be in total chaos. Norms by definition are rules of behavior shared by members of a society and rooted in the value system. ( ) Norms are held at a high standard in a society and are valued by its members. Norms vary from society to society. What is considered normal in one society may not be acceptable in another society. Norms are a societies way of living if a member of society breaks that norm they may be looked at as strange or even penalized depending on what kind of norm is broken. Norms are broken into three categories which are folkways, mores, and laws. Folkways are customs or desirable behaviors that are not strictly enforced. Violating a folkway is not criminal, but violating a folkway may have you looked at as weird. Mores are the strongest form of norms they have great moral significance in a society. Violating a more is considered immoral or borderline criminal. The strongest form of mores are taboos which are unthinkable action within a society. Laws are the third category of norms that a...
Norms are by definition general society guidelines and expectations of appropriate behavioral conduct in a particular environment or society. These guidelines could be formal and written such as laws that prohibit stealing or they could be implicit such as behavioral conduct or dress code. Every society has its own way of endorsing and enforcing certain norms and standards of proper behavior while renouncing and sanctioning improper behavior. In general, norms are of a significant importance because they guide our behavior and maintain order in society by providing conformity. Furthermore, norms render behavior predictable rather than random, thus allowing us to predict and understand other people’s actions and behaviors in different situations. On the other hand, divergence from norms is termed “deviance” and can lead to chaos and instability. It is noteworthy to mention, that the culture background and context play an important role as each culture processes its own norms, values, standards and expectations. For instance, in certain cultures shaking hands between opposite sexes is inappropriate, and this is the case in Yemen. Thus our perception of norms in different culture is critical: either we choose to understand an individual’s behavior according to his own culture context and set of norms (cultural relativity) or we choose to understand an individual’s behavior according to our own culture which we believe to be more superior (ethnocentrism). An example of ethnocentrism where norms and values of a certain culture have been imposed on another is the banning of the veil worn by muslim women in France. In contrast, cultural relativism appears in Lebanon where muslim women are perceived in terms of their own culture and are a...
Norms tend to guide the group. Even unknowingly, members act within the norms established. Staying within these boundaries, which become ingrained in their behavior patterns, the group becomes equipped accomplish its goals. While group norms may help a group progress towards its goal, some norms may also hinder the group from working together