Friday Music: "Wings" - Macklemore

I give you Macklemore's "Wings":



This songs would be great to spark conversation on consumerism, deviance, Strain Theory, and the innovation mode of adaptation.

"Beyond Scared Straight" and the Reinforcement of Deviance

A&E has a series titled Beyond Scared Straight. Check out this clip:


There are several other clips available, much like the one above.

Ironically, as the Justice Department takes steps to make prisons safer for inmates, this show and the program it follows encourage inmates to threaten at-risk youth with violence in order to scare them into reform. It seems likely, however, that such psychological violence and physical threats serve to reinforce the very violent, hyper-masculine posturing that leads young men (and, increasingly, young women) to be incarcerated. These kinds of approaches satisfy the audience's conservative desire for crime deterrence but might actually be perpetuating the problems they hope to allay.

Here is a comical take:

Letting Homer Simpson Teach Labeling Theory

After having my students read a selection from David Rosenhan's now-classic piece of research On Being Sane in Insane Places, I like to show The Simpsons episode Stark Raving Dad. Here is a clip:



The episode is the first of the third season (1991) and stars an uncredited Michael Jackson. I've found that it does a great job of illustrating several concepts, including structural labeling theory, stigma, deviance, type I error (a/k/a false positive), medicalization, mental illness, etc.

George Jetson, Sot

I was listening to a recent episode of The Diane Rehm Show on the rise of  driver-assistance systems (e.g. adaptive cruise control) and the inevitability of autonomous vehicles. One purported advantage of computer-assisted driving is that it would eliminate driver inattentiveness as a cause of accidents. Taken to its logical conclusion, cars would eventually drive riders wherever they'd like to go without the occupant intervening. This means that people could one day in the not-so-distant future safely text and drive and, perhaps, even drink and drive. This struck me as a place that might bring some unintended consequences. Here is my hypothesis: the widespread use of autonomous vehicles will result in an increase in adverse alcohol-related health outcomes. Think about it this way: inasmuch as anti-drunk driving campaigns have successfully attenuated people's drinking overall, the decriminalization of this behavior will mean that people will drink more frequently and in larger quantities. Just an educated guess.

Friday Music: "Jeremy" - Pearl Jam

I give you Pearl Jam's "Jeremy":



The lyrics and subsequent video are reportedly about an actual suicide that lead singer, Eddie Vedder, read about in the newspaper. A Texas teenager shot himself in a classroom, in front of his classmates and teacher. The song is a good setting for discussion about suicide, particularly Durkheim's notions of egoistic and/or anomic suicides. This song would pair well with this post from The Global Sociology Blog that links Merton's Strain Theory to Durkheim's typologies of suicide through current events. This could also parlay into discussions about the social construction of childhood and teenagedom as well as gun violence and gun control.

Running List of Pet Peeves: #12 "Sidewalk Norms"

Hey, if you're walking on a sidewalk, the norm is to stay to your right, like a car. If I were in England, I would consciously walk on the left on the sidewalks, knowing that their norms are different. The people I encounter in Milledgeville, Georgia, are not from England. If I suspected that they were, I would give them the benefit of the doubt, but the truth is that some people--and not just here--decide to flaunt convention and walk on what to them is the left side of the sidewalk. Why? Norms, even weak folkways, tend to be pretty well-followed so why are folks behaving deviantly?

SocImages: Framing Children's Deviance

http://contexts.org/socimages/2010/07/26/framing-childrens-deviance/