"Sociology"
Blogging on the World and the behaviors of society
Three Theories Dealing with Socialization
Socialization is an important part of everyone's life. There are many different individual and external factors that can affect how a person socializes with another person, group, or society. Some of these can include social class, race, gender, and many more. We will look at how the three perspectives of sociology can relate to socialization.
Functionalism: In order for people to socialize, an individual must first conform to the norms that are set in a given society. A perfect example of functionalism dealing with socialization is high school. During these years, unless they're in a private school, teens have the most freedom to express who they are and how they want to display themselves. However, students who dress and act differently than what is normal they may be looked down upon. They may labeled "weird" or "different" and they may be the outcasts school.Their is always a set of norms and values in any society that everyone must conform too. Religion and education are two prime examples of this. Functionalists believe that people become socialized and accept what people expect of them. If not, they may become the social outcasts.
Conflict Theory: Many conflict theorists believe that differences in material wealth play a huge role in whether an individual is properly socialized. This is because a family who is in the upper or middle class are wealthy enough to afford to buy what their children need in order to participate in extracurriculuar activies whereas a lower class child may not. There is also the fact that the parents of the upper class children may have time on their hands to go and watch their child participate. Lower class children most do not likely experience this same support since their parents may be working most of the time. The upper class children have an advantage because of this. They know what it is like to be part of a team and how to communicate with other children as well as their higher ups like a coach or instructor. This difference in wealth could put a lower class child at a huge disadvantage.
Symbolic Interactionism: Socialization is one of the most important factors that creates our "self". We develop this "self" by judging how other interpret our behavior. The only way we are judged is if we throw ourselves out there and socialize. And so this can be traced back since when we were babies. Since we were young we've tested the waters and saw how we could behave, and if we could push the boundaries on any rules set. Based on how we were disciplined or how others reacted would create an idea of how we are expected to act. We also grow up with symbols that show whether we are doing the right thing. A smile or laugh would be a positive reaction which would mean "good". A frown would be the opposite, meaning that we are clearly doing something "bad". We've been socializaing since we our first year of life. As early as then we have been taking symbols and forming our "self".
Gender Bias in the Media
One prime example of gender bias in the media is low female sports coverage. There are tons of female athletes who are extremely talented, but get no recognition for the fact that no one covers it on television. The media is more focused on covering Sunday Nigh Football or the MLB Postseason. Even without these two sports, television channels choose to ignore female sports. For this reason most people usually only know of two female athletes, Serena Williams and Ronda Rousey. This shows how little coverage female sports receive, but even when they do, the female athletes are still expected to maintain a feminine look. Whenever female sports are covered one thing is obvious, the athletes still worry about their looks and go far to look stylish and beautiful.
For example, look at this photo of Ronda Rousey. She is one of the highest paid athletes in America. She is about to get into one of the biggest fights of her life, even then she still tries to maintain her sex appeal. You can see the ammount of makeup on her face and how she's still trying to be stylish. Physcial appeareances should be the least of her worries, but because of gender bias she is expected to look feminine and "beautiful". A female athlete who looks too masculine is looked at as different in our society. That was the main criticism people brought up on social media about Rousey. Fortunately, Rousey is trying to fight back against this bias. She became popular after releasing this statement (warning: offensive language):
"I think it's hilarious if someone says my body looks masculine or something, I'm like; "Listen, just because my body was developed for something other than f*cking millionaires, doesn’t mean it's masculine. I think it's femininely badass as f*ck because there’s not a single muscle on body that isn’t for a purpose because I’m not a do nothin' bitch."
Is There a War on Women?
The "War on Women" is a political expression that describes policies that want to restrict women's rights. I've thought about this before and I still have the same opinion, there is no war on women. The gender bias issue in the media is different because that has to involve money and profit. Women's sports don't receive coverage not because of the gender bias, but because they don't bring as much revenue or ratings as male sports. People don't intentionally mean to ignore women. Besides this, the biggest issue with women and politics is health care and reproductive rights. Women believe that they should be able to make their own choices since it's their body. I completely agree with that. I'm not here to discuss the topic of abortion, but women should definitely have a choice on what to do with their body and child. It's not just men who are trying to attack reproductive rights, it includes a lot of women as well. Most of the opposers seem to also be religious which is why women are also attacking their own gender.
In the end I believe the war on women is a term that exaggerates political conflict. There's been much progress since the beginning of the twentieth century. Right now we're trying to move closer to gender equality, not away.