POSITIVE FUNCTIONS OF UNDECEIVING

Positive functions of the undeserving 

Poor: uses of underclass in America 

By Herbert J Gans 

Poverty is analyzed as cause which can be studied in terms of functions, these functions can be positive and negative depending on their nature, people and interest affected. The poor class are mostly involved in activities which threaten their safety, failing to work, bearing children at a young age and being dependent on welfare. Judgement of the poor are not based on evidence, but derive from a stereotype. Gans discussed five positive functions, they are microsocial, economic, normative-cultural, political and macrosocial. Two microsocial function are risk reduction and scapegoating and displacing. Three economic functions are economic banishment and the reserve army, supplying illegal goods and job creation. Three normative functions are moral legitimation, norm reinforcement and supplying popular culture villains. Three political functions are institutional scapegoating, conservative power shifting and spatial purification. Lastly, two macrosocial function are reproduction of stigma and the stigmatized and extermination of surplus. Changes need tone made in America, in society in our everyday norms. We need to look at situations from not only our point of view but from the worlds view. 

Media magic: making class invisible

Media magic: making class invisible 

The mass media shapes the way people think about each other and the nature of our society. The media provide coverage that is often distorted and misleading towards the poor. The poor and their problems are hidden from most Americans and the attention that they do get offers a series of contradictory and portrayal. The poor are faceless, they are reduced to a number when the yearly Census Bureau is released. The media will portray a person associated with welfare cheat, drug addicts, and greedy panhandlers almost always urban and black. Than they compare these images with a middle class person who are tax evaders, celebrities, wealthy businessmen who are mostly white. When the media tells a story about the poor it is usually through a middle class point of view which makes them seem that they are an inconvenience and an irritation. The media always thinks that the poor people have themselves to blame, that they are they're own faults for being the way they are. This is what William Ryan has called "blaming the victim. The world according to the news media is divided between the "underclass" and everyone else. The information provided form the news media is usually for the upper and middle class, for example the news relating to stock exchange. Not everyone owns them. The Times magazine once concluded that " we are all middle class", " and we all share the same concerns" but this is so untrue. The wealthy worry about investments but the others worry about jobs. Americans can't think straight when it comes to class because the mass media is neither objective, balanced, independent or neutral. We have to know who we are because we have the ability to change if we want to. 

Chapter 8

      It's amazing to me that we still have this problem in our society. Racial segregation has been an issue as long as I can remember. I've been thought about this since I was in elementary and somehow we still see it around us to this day. If someone said to you that there was a robbery at a corner store, the person had on baggy pants boxers showing, they had on a sweater with the hoodie over their head and sneakers on their feet. Is the person your imagining black or white. We have so many issues going on in this world we live in and I don't know when this particular one will change.  
      In the article "Race and class in the American criminal justice system"  David Cole says that our criminal justice system affirmatively depends on inequality. In this article he uses the O.J Simpson case in Los Angeles where Simpson was convicted of a double murder of his ex wife and her friend. There were two groups of students in the court room observing the case. One group of students were white and the other  was black, when Simpson was found not guilty the white group of students were very socked and the black group of students were happy and cheerful clapping for joy at what had happened. They weren't clapping and cheerful because of the winning of the case but because they had thought that the justice system was unfair to the African American race. But then the issue of class came in. 
     Cole thought that if Simpson didn't have the amount of money he had to get a well experienced educated lawyer than he would've been in jail to this day. He also said that a a defendant who cannot afford a lawyer one is provided for them but a wealthy person who could afford a lawyer would never in their live hire the lawyer that was used by an unwealthy person. The lawyers provided by the state are over worked and under paid, they aren't even hire by people who could afford lawyers which seem really unfair to the lawyers themselves and also to defendants who cannot get their own lawyers. 
      This is where class and race plays a huge part our society. We can be the nicest person with the most education you could ever think of but if you don't have money and don't have the right skin color you can't get no where in life. Some people have to work much harder than others to make half of what the wealthy is earning. It is sad to say but, so many people die because they don't have insurance or money to pay for their medication but the wealthy can just pay their way to getting strong and healthy. Don't get me wrong, I know some people work their butts of to get where they are in life but I'm talking about the ones who inherit their wealth and just glide through life without any cares and worries, thinking that the whole world is just at their fingertips. 

CHAPTER 6 SOCIALIZATION

WHERE DO I BEGIN!
  
    When I looked at a man it never occurred to be how difficult they had it in life. They had to be the strong and dominate one. They were taught by their fathers not to cry or not to show their feeling but just to " be a man". Any slight chance of showing weakness would be a disgrace to them or their father. Tony Porter, the main speakers in "A call to men" spoke about how men where taught to be strong, stuff , no pain no emotions with the expectation of anger. He discuss a demonstration he called the man box which was so discussing and disturbing. He even said that when his daughter would come to him crying he would baby her up, but when his son came to him crying he just gave 30 seconds to collect himself and be a man about the situation and talk to him like a man. One heart breaking story he told was that when his brother died his father didn't even what to cry in front of the ladies of the family. And while his father was crying he was apologizing to him for crying. That was just upsetting to be to know that men are embarrassed to cry in public.
       After seeing "Killing Us Softy" by Jean Kilbourne I concluded that women equals sex. Women were just objects, sex slaves. Women had to look a certain way, dress a certain way, think a certain way. Kilbourne talks about the ads around us that advertises women a certain way which has a lot of effect on women themselves. Fashion magazines models keep getting thinner and thinner, some of them even have to retouch some photos to make them look like they have some fat. She goes on to say that women now thinks that looking like little girls is the new sexy. This having them wearing little dresses and degrading them to a lower level. These different advertisements go on to say that women shouldn't eat, or gain weight but she must always be on diets to make herself feel good.
     I can not believe how our society has come to this. We should let people be who they want to be. People in magazines don't even look the way they look in the magazines. When women look at these magazines they feel ugly and can never look like models. I'm glad that our society is kind of coming back to their senses and letting people be who they want to be without any judgement.

CHAPTER 5 How much power do you think you have?

      According to our textbook, power is derived from a Latin word, potere, which means "to be able". Max Weber viewed power as the ability to bring about an intended outcome, even when opposed by others. When I read that definition I immidately thought of an employee being empowered by his or her boss or a professor assigning an assignment to the class and even though the students do not what to do it, they have to in order to pass the class.
       There are three strategies of empowerment, education, which is basically getting the right amount of education you need to get a job that gives you the money that you need and help you accomplish your own goals that you have set for yourselves. Organization involves bringing people together to identify common goals and work to achieve them. For example, if a big company comes to a neighborhood and wants to all the houses to break down so factories could be built, an organization, a group of people from the neighborhood will come together and organize a way to that change from happening. Networking involves reaching outside your immediate circle to find allies. I've never really sit down and thought of power in the ways that are mentioned in this book. I believe that each and everyone of us has an amount of power even if some of us don't recognize it.
        A small 5year old has power over their parents sometimes, when they're in a store and the kid sreams that he wants something. He doesn't stop yelling until his mom gives him what he wants and that's a sign of power. I believe the real power comes from money because people who has money gets more opportunities. Wealthy parents have the ability to send their children to better schools and then later on send their children to better colleges. It's simple, money equals power in my opinion.
       The Milgram expirment was a fine example of power. Micheal F got 12 people from the public came to what they thought was an memory test. They were introduced to someone else who they thought was another voluntare but he was actually an actor for the expirment. Each participant was given a role to play, a teacher which was the voluntare and a learner which was the actor. The teachers were given a list of word pairs which the learner had to memorize and each time the learner gets a multiple choice question wrong he received a voltage shock. With every wrong answer the shock is increased by one voltage shock. The generator went from 15-450 voltes. 9 out of 12 people went up to 450 voltes. I personally could not believe that, I thought people were more compassionate than that. Even though they heard sreams from the person they still went on because the professor who was in charge told them that the expirment requires them to to on. This shows the people subjects to higher authority and will do almost anything if a higher powered person tells them to.
          Our society has a lot of power over who we are and who we become. The Five Faces of Oppression explains how society acts as a puppet master of our lives. Exploitation is when a higher authority uses their power to exploit employees such as sweat shop workers. Marginalization is when a group is confined to a lower edge if society. Marx's theory socialism some "have" power while others "have not" refers to powerlessness. For example slaves felt powerless, they thought little of themselves. Culture imperialism is when a group that have power in society control how the people in that society interpret and communicate. This is a perfect example of society and the power it has over us. And lastly violence is a way to portray power over all types of people. It's purpose is to damage, humiliate and destroy a person.
            After I read this chapter I realized power is everywhere. We could either have power or be empowered. I just believe that it is up to us, we determine where we stand in society and how we are treated by others. This chapter really thought me a lot.

SOCIAL STRUCTURE CHAPTER 4

      Social structure refers to the recurring patterns of behavior that make social life possible. Understanding social structure helps us to see connections between these patterns and people's actions and beliefs. Making a connection to chapter three, culture is like the foundation of social structure. It is where people from all over the world share their different beliefs and actions with the world around us. A simple thing like going to your first day of class at your college can be referred to as social structure as shown in our text book. This is an example of our social norms where the first day of class can be the same as every other first days of classes that you have experienced in the past. When we enter a classroom we know exactly what to do and exactly what to expect for that day.
      We can see social structure at the micro level for example, we might look at the structure of interaction between two people or in a small group. Although it might be a small number of people, we can still see social structure, for example when you see someone its a norm to greet them with a greeting such as hi or hello. When you ready to leave you give them a kiss and say goodbye. The meso level of social structure is bigger than just two people or a small group, it is an organization. A school or a business would be a perfect example of  a meso  level of social structure. Another level would be macro, this is in the structure of work. Examples of this level could be based on the behaviors of families, the economy, government, education and religion which are interrelated.
      Social structure has changed from time to time through actions. There are three types of actions, traditional, affective and rational. Traditional action is motivated by custom, its related to what happened in the past will be the same in the future. This is information that is passed on from parents to children and than down from generation to generation. Affective action is guided by emotions and feelings. For example, when Obama gave his speech most of the people that were listening and who were on his side was crying because of feelings. The last one is rational action motivated actions of efficiency. In my own opinion this is an example of being a realist, setting goal that can be achieved. Laying down way of achieving theirs goals with structure and planing ahead.
      The way we live our lives has changed from the years that have past us by. One example is having a telephone and now it being called smart phones. When telephones came out it was only used by business people and now almost everyone has a touch screen phone even as young as a 5 year old can use one. Our society is heading for change and all we can do is keep up with it

CULTURE CHAPTER 3

          Culture is  the collection of values, beliefs, knowledge, norms, language, behaviors, and material objects shared by a people and socially transmitted from generation to generation. Culture is all around us these days. We live in the United States of America and every where we turn we see different culture all around us. This is a land of immigrants and day by day we have to learn to except others for who they are and what principals they live by. In our world today we need to respect each and everyone we come across our day to day lives. As we study sociology and see that the definition of a society is a group of people who live together in a specific territory and share a culture, we can certainly combine the two together and see how they go hand in hand.
          Material culture is the physical objects produced by people in a particular culture. This is why we see different people in different clothing and its all because they have a different insight on clothing only because of there culture. Some people who migrate from their countries would come to New York and build house which for them would appear normal but for others would be abnormal.  Nonmaterial culture is the ideas of the culture, including values and beliefs, accumulated knowledge about how to understand and navigate the world, and standards or "norms" about appropriate behavior. This is basically what ideas a particular culture believes in, the ideas that they pass on to future generations.
          I immigrated to this country when I was only ten years old and I had to start a whole new different life. I didn't know the norms of this society. I didn't know how to dress, how to speak properly, what was normal, what clothes to wear and what not to wear. All of these things I had to take into consideration even though I was only ten years old but I got through it. It took a while for me to get familiar with the norms of this culture but I got it. I had to learn about the ideology of this new culture that I was facing but at the end and ten years later I concerned it. I'm not going to lie and say it was a  piece of cake because it wasn't but as time passed and with help from my friends and family I got through it.
        In our world today we are exposed to so many different cultures around us. This gives us an opportunity to get to know little bits of the world everyday. We can meet so many people from different parts of the world just by taking the train to and from work. There are ups and down to this situation, where diversity can take place. Conflict can form itself because someone beliefs can be different from others and this can lead to social inequality among our day to day lives.