Sometimes larger patterns encompass smaller ones. Consider, for example, the problem of sexual harassment at work. The typical harasser is a man. In fact, almost all harassers are men, and almost all victims are women, so there is a clear pattern of men sexually harassing women. Does this mean that women never harass men? No. In a tiny percentage of cases, women are the perpetrators.
Perhaps you think if women can be harassers and men the victims, that means you cannot generalize about men being the villains all the time. That is true; men are not the villains all the time, but the pattern still exists: Most perpetrators are men (and even when men are the victims, the perpetrators are still usually other men). But if women can sometimes be perpetrators, then we need to look for a larger pattern. If we study actual cases, we find that women who harass are like men in one important way: They have power over others at work.
The larger pattern thus has to do with power. If we look only at the most obvious pattern (men harassing women), we might fail to see the importance of power. But if we also look at rare cases (women harassing men), we are forced to think about what else might be going on. What we would see - the commonality that reveals a larger pattern - is that harassment of all kinds is most likely to occur when one person has control over another person's fate.
To see a pattern is not to know why it exists. Why do some people repeatedly trap themselves in bad situations? Why are rates of disease higher among some groups than others? Why do some people abuse their power and exploit others? Such patterns might be easy to see but hard to explain. Often we must dig deeper to find out why things happen as they do.
To see patterns in how stars work, we must study them in the ways that physicists and astronomers do. To see patterns in how organisms work, we must study them in the ways that biologists do. To make sense of the social world - to see and explain the patterns that make the world what it is - we must study how people do things together, the meanings and arrangements they create, the ideas they embrace, and the cultural habits they form. Only by paying attention to these things, can we see the patterns that matter in people's lives.
There is more to this than looking for typical cases. To identify a typical case of something is to discern one kind of pattern. Other kinds of patterns can be seen if we pay attention to the social world in different ways. Being sociologically mindful, we may discover that the world is patterned in many ways.
*SOURCE: THE SOCIOLOGICALLY EXAMINED LIFE, 2ND EDITION, 2001, MICHAEL SCHWALBE, PGS. 102-103*
The teacher sometimes asked his students to read a story called "A Typical Date Rape." The story describes a situation in which heavy drinking, misplaced trust, poor communication, the subtle threat of violence, and a man's refusal to take "no" for an answer result in rape. One time a woman read the story in class and said, "There is no such thing as a typical date rape. Each case is unique." The teacher disagreed.
The teacher said that the man who wrote the story had studied many cases of date rape, and that the story summed up what he had learned. This explanation did not convince the student. She insisted that each case is unique. The teacher said, "Yes, each case may be unique in its details, but every case has common features." Another student then offered this: "I've done counseling at the women's' center, and I can tell you that this story is very realistic. It fits the pattern that I have seen over and over."
As it turned out, the student who insisted that each case is unique, admitted that she knew of only one other case - one that did not quite fit the pattern described in the story. Because of this, she thought that there were no patterns, and that it was impossible to generalize. She was mistaken.
Part of being sociologically mindful is seeing that the social world works in patterned ways. Many of the patterns are easy to see. Millions of people get up in the morning, go to work for 8 hours, come home, eat, sleep, and then get up and do it again. That is one kind of pattern, which exists because many people do things together in the same way, over and over again. In fact, that is what a pattern is: a regularity in the way the world works.
The story about the rape described a pattern, one that was harder to see. It required the study of many cases of date rape to bring the pattern to light. It often takes a lot of work to discover patterns in social life, because some kinds of events do not happen every day. If you were asked to describe a typical bank robbery, you would have to study quite a few cases to see what they had in common. perhaps then you would see a pattern.
Some of the patterned ways in which the social world works are obvious. Some are not. Being sociologically mindful means paying attention in a disciplined way, so that we begin to see patterns that are not so obvious. To be disciplined, in this sense, is to stick to certain rules of procedure when trying to see what is going on in the world. If we pay attention carelessly, we will still see things going on, but many patterns will remain invisible to us.
For example, it would be possible to examine many date rapes, bank robberies, and other crimes, and find no patterns. This might happen because we failed to get the same kinds of facts about each case, so we might fail to see what a lot of cases have in common. A good rule of procedure for paying attention might therefore be: "Always get the same facts about every case." To stick to this rule - when it would be easier to ignore it - is what it means to pay attention in a disciplined way.
One reason to be mindful of patterns is that if we want to change the world, we must be aware of the patterns that make the world what is. If we want to reduce rape, for example, it is helpful to know what conditions, thoughts, and actions typically lead to rape.
We can apply this principal - the need to grasp the pattern that produces a particular result - to anything we might like to change. To stop the spread of a disease, for example, we must know how it is spread, and to find this out we must look for a pattern. Where do cases arise? Among which people? What do these people have in common? Have they all been to the same place, engaged in the same activity, or even the same food? By answering these questions, we can figure out what the pattern is and how to keep the disease from spreading.
Sometimes it is important to be aware of and to disrupt patterns in our own thoughts and behaviors. Imagine a person who always agrees to help other people with their projects. Helping others makes this person feel good, but too much helping keeps her from getting her own work done. Because she does not get her own work done, she feels like a failure and gets depressed. Suppose this happens over and over again. If the person becomes aware of the pattern, perhaps she can change. All that might be necessary is learning to say "no" when the requests for help become too great.
*SOURCE: THE SOCIOLOGICALLY EXAMINED LIFE, 2ND EDITION, 2001, MICHAEL SCHWALBE, PGS. 100-102*
All behavior, even that which seems perfectly normal, must be understood in context. Being mindful of context can lead us to reconsider what is outrageous and what is normal.
Suppose that instead of running amok, people carry on politely and calmly. What could be wrong with this? After all, is this not what most of us are taught to do. Yes, and most of the time it is fine that we do. Unfortunately, we can get so used to being so polite and calm that we failed to be outraged by horrific things going on around us. Nazi Germany is the most often cited twentieth-century example. Millions of people were killed in concentration camps, while most Germans went about their business without protest. How can we understand this complacency?
In Germany, as in other nations, the government claimed the right to use violence to control people within its borders. The German government, like other governments, collected taxes and used this wealth to build means to do violence (by creating police forces, armies, spying agencies, weapons, and so on). Germans relied on this government to protect them from outsiders, to keep internal order, and to give them a feeling of belonging to a special group. Before and during World War II, most German people thought their government was doing these jobs reasonably well, or at least not so badly as to inspire a mass revolt.
Think of the German government (its employees, the rules by which it operated, and the resources it possessed) as an instrument for doing the will of those who controlled it. When the Nazi rulers gained control of the German government, they gained control of an organization that was equipped with (or had the legitimacy to gather and employ) vast resources of people, information, money, and weapons. It would have been hard for unorganized dissenters to resist such an entity.
The German government was also highly bureaucratic. Like any such organization, it had many rules and policies, and layers of management, for keeping people under control. It was thus hard for people to challenge their bosses, or even to find out what was going on. If you have had much experience working in large bureaucratic organizations, you know the problem.
Even when people began to see what was going on. most felt powerless and afraid to do anything. People who worked in the government and military bureaucracies - people who morally opposed the mass murder that was going on in the concentration camps - could justify their failure to protest by saying, "I'm not killing anyone. I'm not pulling the trigger. I'm just doing my job." After the war, many of the Nazi leaders who were charged with crimes against humanity defended themselves by saying, "I was only following orders." If those who actually killed could invoke this defense, imagine how much easier it was for people far from the killing to do so.
Looking back, the Nazi regime seems monstrous and insane. We wonder how anyone could have supported it, directly or indirectly. But again, consider the context.
After losing World War I, many Germans had feelings of injured national pride. Many were also angry about the terms under which they were forced to surrender in World War I. The German economy was faltering (in the context of a global recession in the 1930s), and many people worried about their jobs and income. So it was, that many people were angry, resentful, and insecure - and confused about who was to blame.
In this context the Nazis offered appealing messages: Other nations were to blame for limiting Germany's ability to recover from World War I; Jews, communists, homosexuals were to blame for weakening Germany from the inside, and Germans were a naturally superior people, who if given a fair chance, could again build a great nation. These messages reinflated national pride, and gave people easy answers to resolve their fears and anxieties.
We should also remember that once the Nazis gained control of the German government, they gained great power to shape people's thoughts and feelings. They used the government to make and control the news, to spread propaganda, and to stifle dissent. Many German people were thus at the mercy of the Nazi government, when it came to knowing what was going on in their country and in the world. As in any nation-state, the government in Germany was a powerful tool for creating social reality.
If you have stayed with me through this unpleasant example, you might be wondering what is the point of all this? Is it to show why the German people got caught up in acts of great evil? Yes, that is part of it. The more important point, however, is not about Germany in the 1930s and 1940s. It is about how we live here and now.
We still live in a world of nation states, none of which is truly democratic, and all of which have governments that can be captured by those seeking power for their own benefit. The governments of these nation-states are capitalist, which means that many people are likely to feel insecure about their jobs and income. There is also still plenty of racism to fuel scapegoating. Conditions, thus, remain ripe for holocausts to happen.
In Conclusion
Perhaps you think, "All this is true, so it is fortunate that we live in a country with a benevolent government." That is certainly a comforting illusion. Being sociologically mindful, however, we will try to look at matters in a larger context, and consider how things appear to Iraqis, Vietnamese, Nicaraguans, Cubans, Chileans, Guatemalans, and the citizens of other countries that have been invaded, bombed by, or otherwise forced to obey the wishes of those who run the U.S. government. We might also want to consider the perspectives of Native Americans, who can tell us something about the benevolence of the U.S. government.
*SOURCE: THE SOCIOLOGICALLY EXAMINED LIFE, 2ND EDITION, 2001, MICHAEL SCHWALBE, PGS. 94-96*
Being sociologically mindful of context also means paying attention to culture - the beliefs, values, and practices that are shared and transmitted from one generation to the next, among a group of people. Culture too has to be put in a larger context, since culture is a group's adaption to the environment in which it exists. Beliefs and behaviors that might seem strange, usually make sense when we consider the conditions under which a group is trying to survive.
If we take culture into account, we can appreciate how behavior that seems weird or wrong to outsiders is normal and proper to insiders. This is not to say that any behavior is okay, merely because it is some group's traditional way of doing things, or because it aids their survival. It is to say we cannot understand what people do, and why, without considering what they have been taught to see as normal and correct in their world.
We must remember too that people do not choose the worlds into which they are born. If we are born into a world of calm and wealth, we might learn to get what we need simply by asking for it. If we are born into a world of scarcity, struggle, and despair, we might learn that our survival depends on being aggressive, even violent. The point is not to justify aggression and violence, but to say that understanding others' behavior in context requires understanding the nature of the world that has formed their survival habits.
Imagine growing up in a place where any sign of weakness made you prey to abuse. Imagine that your survival depended on swift retaliation for any threat to your dignity, especially in public. Now imagine that your first job is a sales clerk. In this job, you must put up with being bossed by your boss, teased by coworkers, and insulted by customers, Will you respond day after day, with patience and god humor; or will you fall back on your old habits, and one day give your boss, a coworker, or a customer a punch in the nose?
If you come from a different background, you might think all low-level jobs require putting up with some obnoxious people. You just have to bear it until you get into a better position. If you believe this, it is because you have learned to mask your feelings, and do what the boss says, so as to get along and prosper. This strategy pays off well in some worlds, but it does not work everywhere, and it has costs.
Suppose you have formed the habit of doing as you are told. Imagine that this habit has gotten you a nice job with a high salary. One day you realize that a product your company plans to make is defective in a way that will injure some of the people who use it. You argue that the product should be redesigned to be safer but you are told, "That will raise production costs too much. We will make it as planned. If anyone gets hurt, insurance will cover it." So you rely on the habit that has helped you succeed: You do as you are told. Then, as you foresaw, some people are badly hurt by your company's product.
After all this is revealed to the public, outsiders say that you should have blown the whistle, or quit your job in protest. You could have kept people from being hurt, but you did not. Why? We could say that you are weak and irresponsible. Or we could try to understand your behavior in context.
We should be mindful of your options as you saw them. Did you think you would be fired if you protested any harder? Did you think you could find another job if you quit, or were fired? Did you believe that your career would be ruined if you blew the whistle, because of how whistle blowers are treated by other employers? Perhaps you had children to think about. If you had lost your job, how would you pay for your food, clothing, shelter, medicine, school, and so on. So perhaps you felt compelled, for their sake, to keep your mouth shut.
We should also be mindful of what your job meant to you. Perhaps, like most people in us culture, you learned to stake your identity on our job, so losing your job would have been devastating to you. Or perhaps you were taught that the boss who gives orders, not the worker who carries them out, is responsible for the results. That is a dangerous belief, also common in U.S. society, but we cannot blame you for inventing, and putting it in your head.
To understand your behavior in this example, we would have to be mindful of several contexts at once. The firm in which you had little power; the family and friendship networks of which you were a part; and the competitive and individualistic society, in which, you reasonably feared for your ability to make a decent living. In light of these circumstances, your behavior, though not admirable, would at least make sense.
*SOURCE: THE SOCIOLOGICALLY EXAMINED LIFE, 2ND EDITION, 2001, MICHAEL SCHWALBE, PGS. 83-85*
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