Blog 15

I never knew that depending on how far you stand from a person while talking to them defines what social class you belong in. By watching the video in class with the WASPS and people from the lower class I have realized what kind of things define what social class you are in. For example the boy whose mom works at burger king wears a sweater vest just for show so his friends don't think that he is from the working poor class. When in reality he lives in a trailer house in very poor conditions. This shows by the way you dress other people will define what class you come from. Its also interesting how one of the WASP said the someone wore a suit instead of a tux and he was in shock how the person was even let in! Again people are being judged on what they wear. Also in the video one of the WASP guys said that you can define what class someone belongs in depending if they have a part in their hair or not. I thought that this all was very interesting because I don't believe that depending on how far you stand from a person or if you have a part in your hair comes into play when determining ones social class ranking.

Deviance

          As I got out of the car at the train station on the morning of a late arrival, I happened to notice that the girl that parked next to me was in a rush. So, I looked at the space number that she parked in and I went to the ticket box and not only paid for my ticket but also hers. It is against our society norms for someone to freely pay for something of someone else's when you don't even know them.

Norms

So far this semester in sociology has made me realize how odd our norms of society are and how every individual is looked at differently. I thought how it is very unfair that if a boy does something that is against a male norm and is more of a female norm he is automatically criticized and considered gay. But if a female does a norm that is originally for males she is just looked at as athletic. Why is it that our society is so much more judgmental on males than females? It is because males have to live up to being a strong, tall, manly jock and if he is not able to meet that requirement then he is harassed by the other males that were able to. It is not in a males control of how tall he is going to be, it is in his genes. Why should he be punished for something he cannot even control? There have been many stories of young male teens who have committed suicide because of being harassed by males that were able to meet our society norms of a male and they weren't. Someone has CHOSEN to end their life just because of being hurt and harassed. Not only is this seen in males but also females. Females have an expectation to live up to being this skinny, naturally beautiful, perfect skin, and big breasted women. Many women are not informed of all the photoshop and editing that is done to the female models that are plastared on billboards or in magazines. Females our comparing themselves to a body image that doesn't even exist but they are not informed of that. Females have suffered from eating disorders, depression and many other issues due to trying to live up to an image of a body that in nonexistent. Why is it that in our society people have to suffer from issues that aren't always even in their control? Why do we even care so much about what others even look like? Humans come in many different shapes and sizes. I have come to think differently now by that I have become less judgmental of a person and do not create a stereotype of a person just off of what I have seen them do. Also I have been less harsh on myself and other males/females about living up to our society norms of what we should look like because it is completely unreasonable. We shouldn't spend our life trying to meet that expectation. We only live once, and life is short; So why get caught up in what our societies expectations of us?

Gender

Blog 10 Ive never realized how judgemental our society is on gender especially on boys more than girls. Many of the things that we have been talking about in class have helped me come to realize this. For example when we split up toys by gender and realize that it would be ok for a girl to play with a toy that is for boy but would just be looked at as a girl who is athletic or classified as a "tomboy". Which is normal and a girl would not be harrassed or called any names for playing with toys that are for boys. But if a boy was to play with barbies or play dress-up and wear a dress he would be classified as "gay". The boy would be humiliated at school and some parents would even be ashamed of their kid and not allow it. I thought this was very intresting that our society is more harsh and judgemental on young boys than girls. Just because a boy wears a dress doesnt mean he is gay, kids go through many phases when they our young.

Blog #5

Culture Shock

We don't realize that in our culture we have so many things to be grateful for having that we normal take advantage of. We are used to having cars, living in houses, having our own bedroom/bathrooms, and the overall cleanliness. I experienced a culture shock when I went to Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. We got picked up from the airport and got driven to our resort which was an hour away. During the drive we had to pass through villages that the mexican families lived in. Along the car ride I saw many things that were very "un-normal". People were not wearing shoes, and were wearing torn up clothing. There were kids sleeping on the dirt ground outside of shacks (not even on grass because there was none) and at first I didn't believe that families actually lived in those "huts". But in the car I made small talk with the driver he was very willing to share his life with us. He lived in one of those shacks and had 1 other brother, 2 sisters, a mom, a dad, and a grandma that he shared it with. What I was most shocked about that he shared with me was that they did not have any water so that ment no bathrooms, sinks, etc. He had to walk 2 miles to a near by pond to get water because they could not afford water or anything much. Another thing i was shocked about was how much they get payed which was very little and could barely live off of it. I was in very much shock by everything he told me and my thoughts were that i would never be able to live there and felt very bad for them.

Blog #4

During this week we discussed the three different sociological theories which are conflict theory, functionalism, and symbolic interactionism. Each theory is different from the other. Conflict theory is that the society is composed of groups competing for power. Mostly everywhere you go in our society there are always people competing for power whether it is in the government, at school, or work; the competition for power is always there. For example, everyday in school it is almost like the students and teachers are competing over a power struggle regarding texting during class. Functionalism is that a society is a whole unit made up of inter-related parts and each structure has a function that contributes to the whole. We all need each other to be able to function. We need our doctors to create cures, mailmen to deliver our mail, government to print our money, police to save us, etc. Symbolic interactionism are interpretations that change throughout time and symbols that are essential for relationships to exist.

Time is money.

Everyday we don't realize but everything we do is based off of time. Without a clock to tell what time it is, everyone would be lost.

People have routines. Wake up, eat breakfast, go to school, have lunch, come home, go to activities, do homework, go to bed. Then the next day do the same thing again, at the same times. That day in class Ms. Breuer told us that story about that teacher in Brazil and how he was confused how the people there don't do things based on the time made me realized how our society is corrupt. Our society is so busy, busy we do everything based off of time, everyone is always looking at the clocks being impatient knowing that there is always somewhere they need to be. I wonder what a day would be like if all the clocks in our society were frozen and no one would know what time it is? How would everyone react?

So far we have only been in sociology for 8 days. I have learned a lot about what I think and what others think. An example is why do we do certain things so people will base their opinion of you off of that when really we don't care what others think of us. Why don't we just be ourselves in the first place? The class has made me come to realize things so far about us and our interaction with others.