Deviance is behavior or attitude that is seen as violating the expected norms and rules of the society. It means nonconformity to societal norms. Nonetheless, the response comes from social expectations of the community. According to sociologists, not all behaviors are judged similarly by all existing groups. What seems to be deviant to one group may not appear to be deviant in another group. Moreover, sociologists also acknowledge that created norms and rules are socially developed, not just personally imposed or morally chosen. This means that deviance lies in the behavior itself as well as in groups’ social responses to actions by other individuals. People require norms to exist. Standards assist in making social life possible by making human behavior predictable. Therefore, all human societies come up with a system of social control, which includes informal together with formal means of enforcing norms. Individuals who go against this rules face the danger of being called “deviant.” Those who violate the rules should expect to experience sanctions that are negative for going against group norms. Those who conform to the standards of the society, particularly individuals who go above and beyond the expectations of the community, get positive sanctions. The essay is going to examine the available literature supporting why deviant behavior should not make a person an outsider or social deviant.
According to Howard Becker, outsiders are people who break the norms of a group. Becker states that those who break the rules may see an individual who effects the law as an outsider. The society is responsible for creating deviance. Groups in the society come up with deviance by coming up with rules whose infraction is made of deviance, and by applying those norms to specific individuals and giving them the label, “outsiders.” Thus, deviance is not the act the person commits, but instead a result of the application by other people of norms and sanctions to an offender (Gibbs, 2010). A deviant person is one whom that label has triumphantly being applied hence deviant behavior is behavior that individuals so label.
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Deviant behavior should not make an individual an outsider because when a person is labeled as deviant because of committing a particular crime, they tend to accept this label as part of themselves. When an individual sees themselves as being a deviant in the society, they are more likely to persist in exhibiting deviant behavior. Primary deviance starts with a first criminal act, after which a person might be labeled as a deviant person or criminal, but he or she fails to accept this label. The name becomes an individual’s “master status,” which implies that this is a fixed label, influencing and over-riding how other people see them. When a person is labeled as deviant, he or she has no choice but to get more and more involved in criminal activities. The individual has been forced by the society into the role of deviant hence the person has little choice but to deviant.
People should not be labeled as deviants or outsiders because according to interactionists, deviance is explained by a social reaction which implies that the action of an individual is not considered deviant until a group labels it as such and in this manner, deviant individuals are not that different from regular people who conform to norms. Interactionists think that because of this point, there are no universal causes of deviance or crime that can be discovered by sociologists. Deviance is relative as it differs from time and place and it is explained by each society and situation differently within groups in communities. Therefore, no one deserves to be labeled because of going against the norms of the society for a person may be seen as deviant to one group but at the same time be seen as a real person by another group.
Also, Becker states that many individuals sometimes commit acts that are nonconforming without becoming involved in a constant pattern of deviant actions (Becker, 2008). The most important reason to explain this is that most individuals do not get caught in their criminal activities and thus remain secret deviants. One of the most significant factors in the process of association with a deviant career following Becker is “the experience of being caught and publicly labeled as deviant (Becker, 2008) .” It does not matter who the individual was before being labeled. The reactions of the other people to this person now pay more attention to one overwhelming area of his or her identity hence given the deviant status.
As a consequence of people’s reactions, the next step in creating a career in deviance is that a person is likely to be cut from participating in more simple groups. For example, an individual who has been labeled as a drug addict or homosexual may fail to secure employment in a respectable job. As a matter of fact, the deviant may have no choice but to involve himself with pursuits typically assumed of such an individual. As a result, deviant behavior should not make one a social deviant.
A person who engages in deviant behavior should not be labeled as deviant because people labeled as deviants tend to form deviant groups for an association. Members belonging to a deviant group confirms an individual’s self-identity as the type of deviant he or she has been labeled. Furthermore, members of such a group develop a common sub-culture in which they form ideas and understandings about what the universe is like and how to manage it. The subculture supplies the deviant with justifications and rationalizations for more deviant activity. Therefore, a deviant person who finally ends up in a deviant group and agrees with its subculture tends to continue in his deviant ways (Higgins, 2010).
In my opinion, people should not be labeled as deviants or outsiders just because they have committed a deviant act because if they accept the label, they become deviants even if they were wrongly labeled. Labeling someone as deviant encourages that person to continue involving themselves in deviant acts. Also, the deviant person becomes stigmatized, and he or she tends to form a group with other deviants. As a result, the group influences each other to carry on with their deviant activities.
The study could have been improved by studying groups of people who have been labeled as deviants and others who have not been given the name. That way, the researchers would be able to come up with more accurate results about the effects of labeling people as deviants. Studying both groups is essential as one will be able to understand the motives behind the labeling and the effects it has on people.
The research has enhanced my views about this topic whereby am now well aware of the implications of labeling. Labeling a person as deviant or an outsider shapes the individual in the image other people have of him. Therefore, am now well aware that people should not be labeled to decrease their chances of going back to crime again. Labeling can make a person engage in many criminal activities because of his new self-identity. Most importantly, the treatment of deviants declines them the reasonable means of continuing with their routines of everyday life open to most individuals. The deviants come up with illegitimate methods as a result of this denial.
In a nutshell, deviant behavior is behavior that does not conform to the norms of a society or group. It is not okay for a person who has engaged in deviant behavior to be labeled as an outsider or social deviant. Labeling an individual as deviant encourages that person to continue with deviant acts when he or she accepts the status. Deviants might also be denied opportunities in the society because of their label, for instance, employment opportunities. As a result, they may form deviant groups which will further facilitate the behavior.
References
Becker, H. S. (2008). Outsiders. Simon and Schuster.
Gibbs, J. P. (2010). Conceptions of deviant behavior: The old and the new. Pacific Sociological Review 9.1 , 9-14.
Higgins, M. B. (2010). Self-confessed troublemakers: An interactionist view of deviance during organizational change. human relations , 300-312.
