Week Six Blog Entry: Changing Social Connections

After reading this week’s chapter on groups, networks, and organizations, I do believe that people are more isolated due to technology. When answering this question, I first thought about the Internet and how that applies to the topic. The Internet is a way to form networks, which are sets of informal and formal social ties that link people to each other. However, I believe that these networks consist more of people that you know indirectly than directly. This makes interactions on the Internet less personal. In addition, these networks tend to be very large groups of people. As groups increase in number from dyads and triads to larger groups, the intensity of interaction between people decreases. This means that each person would be more isolated.

I also think that technology has made people more isolated in regards to interactions via the phone. It used to be that people would talk on the phone. Just being able to hear a person’s voice and the emotion they are expressing makes a conversation more personal. Now, most people tend to text message instead of having actual phone conversations. I think this could lead to a person feeling more isolated.

Week Five Blog Entry: Criminal Justice System

One topic from the reading on the Criminal Justice System is the death penalty. I disagree with the death penalty for a couple of reasons. One reason I disagree with it is because of the chance of false conviction. As science progresses year after year, we keep finding new ways to test evidence in court cases. In recent years, DNA testing has proved some criminals to be innocent that were previously convicted as guilty. If a person were convicted of a crime and their life was terminated due to the death penalty, there is a chance that we could find out due to technological advances in the future that this person had really been innocent. Taking the life of a person who even has a chance of being innocent is too much of a risk, in my opinion.

However, the main reason that I disagree with the death penalty is because I think that this gives a truly evil person an easy escape from the consequences of their action. Lets say, for example, that a 20 year old committed a mass murder and took the lives of many innocent people. If they were sentenced to life in prison, this would give them 60-80 years to spend every single day paying for the actions that they chose. I think that this is a much worse punishment for a criminal than the death penalty gives them.

Week Four Blog Entry: Nurture vs. Nature Debate

The nurture versus nature debate seeks the answer to the following question: are we a product of our genes or are we a product of the environment we grew up in? I personally believe that there is not a single answer to this question; I think that we are both a product of nature and of nurture. Lets take, for example, a personality trait that I have: vulnerability to stress. There has been research done that this is a trait that is passed through genes. However, the environment that I grow up in determines whether or not this vulnerability to stress will cause me to be a stressed out person. If I were to grow up in a home where my situation was unstable and my parents were abusive, that would cause this vulnerability to stress to come out much more than if I grew up in a calm environment. I believe that many traits have a genetic component, but that the way a person is brought up determines how these traits are expressed.

One example from the book that I have considered in this debate are gender roles. There are some obvious genetic differences between boys and girls, such as the difference in genitalia,  body fat percentage, and average height. These are qualities are based on nature (for the most part). Freud argues that gender identity is brought about by the presence or absence of a penis, and that this causes boys to identify with their fathers (who do have a penis) or girls to identify with their mothers (who don't have a penis). His would be an argument towards nature. However, I think that there is more to this than Freud's theory explains. Chodorow's theory discusses the fact that girls are brought up to have close relationships with their mothers, while boys are taught to dissociate from their mothers. I believe that this theory is correct, at least in American society. This theory would argue that nurture provides more of an influence in gender identity than nature. Therefore, I think that people are a combination of both their nurture and their nature.

Week Three Blog Entry: American Culture as Viewed by Other Cultures

This clip of Fry and Laurie was not very long, but it showed a lot about the way Americans are viewed in England. I am from England originally, and all of my extended family still lives there, so I do have some additional insight into how we are viewed. The first thing I noticed about this clip is that he just kept repeating “America” and “the States.” I think that this showed that the American culture is viewed as being very proud of ourselves and slightly arrogant about this fact. The second thing I noticed is the attire that Hugh Laurie was wearing. He had a bandana tied around his head and was wearing an unbuttoned plaid shirt. This showed that our culture is viewed as all having that type of style. His attire and the way that he was singing seemed like he was a country singer. This showed that we are viewed as all liking this type of music. The last thing that I noticed was the ending where the other man came in and punched him. This showed that the British culture is different to the American culture, and that they get annoyed with people who fit the stereotype that Hugh Laurie is portraying.