Thesis statement
When it comes to discussing what prompts people to behave in one way or another, it is crucially important to understand that, in order for them to be able to effectively interact with the surrounding environment; they must act as socially integrated beings. This is the reason why, as sociologists and psychologists are well aware of, it is in the very nature of the representatives of Homo Sapiens species to seek the affiliation with mind-likes.
By being the part of a group, consisted of people who share the same set of existential values, a particular individual is able to increase its chances to advance in life. Nevertheless, it is namely the specifics of people’s genetic constitution, which define the qualitative subtleties of their longing to become the part of a collective. In my paper, I will explore the validity of this statement at length, in regards to the documentaries People like us: Social class in America (Cnam2000, 2009) and The Devil’s playground (Lasrever, 2008).
Analytical part
The foremost idea that is being promoted throughout the video People like us: social class in America is that, despite its adherence to the principle of a social egalitarianism, American society continues to remain strongly stratified along the lines of class.
American citizens that belong to the upper class are the ones able to enjoy their lives to the fullest, while being in charge of designing this country’s domestic and foreign policies. On the other hand, those citizens that happened to be affiliated with lower social classes, do not merely experience a hard time, while trying to attain a societal prominence, but very often suffer from malnutrition.
Nevertheless, even though that the film’s creators deliberately withdrew from advocating their personal point of view, as to what causes Americans to remain socially stratified, People like us: Social class in America does contain a number of insights, as what should be considered the dialectical preconditions for people to strive to emphasize their affiliation with a particular social class. These insights can be outlined as follows:
a) There is a very little rationale in referring to the phenomenon of class-stratification within the American society, as solely the consequence of the national wealth being unequally distributed among the country’s citizens. For example, there is a memorable scene in the documentary, where a sloppy dressed man with a beer-can in his hands, expounds on how proud he is to belong to the ‘redneck nation’.
After having been asked whether he would consider changing his lifestyle of a ‘redneck’, if he was able to afford it, the interviewed person provided a negative response.
b) One’s financial riches do not automatically allow the concerned individual to become the part of a ‘high society’. As it appears from the video, the representatives of social elites apply a great effort into guarding their societal privileges, to which they are being entitled by the very fact of their belonging to the country’s ‘top class’.
This is being reflected by these people’s tendencies to regard the so-called ‘self-made’ individuals with a suspicion. As one of the interviewed persons noted; whereas, one’s wealthiness may be purely accidental; there is nothing accidental about the concerned individual’s ability to maintain it. In other words, in order for a particular rich individual to be admitted to the ‘club’, he or she would have to prove the sincereness of its commitment to the existential values, shared by the ‘club’s’ other members.
c) It is in people’s very nature to strive to accentuate their superiority. As it was implied in the video, people’s foremost priority in life can be well considered their genetically predetermined tendency to seek the confirmation of their existential worth. This is the reason why the people’s sense of greed knows no limits – the richer a particular individual happened to be, the higher is his or her likelihood to think of itself, as such that experiences the acute ‘shortage’ of money.
This, of course, deems the egalitarianism-promoting political ideologies conceptually fallacious – being nothing but hairless primates, in the biological sense of this word, people are naturally driven towards securing their ‘environmental niche’ in life, at the expense of depriving their competitors of the same opportunity.
This is the reason why parents strive to convince their children to pursue ‘prestigious’ professional careers (such as the career of a lawyer, for example) – these careers provide their affiliates with the opportunity to generate disproportionally large amounts of money, while applying a disproportionally small effort. Ideally, just about everyone dreams of not having to work at all, without experiencing any shortage of financial means.
This once again confirms the validity of the evolutionary theory, according to which people evolved from apes. After all, in the societies of primates, alpha-males have only one social ‘duty’ – to enjoy themselves in just about any way they choose to, in times free from imposing their dominance upon females and weaker males.
Just as it happened to be the case with the earlier mentioned documentary, the main theme of The Devil’s playground, concerned with exposing the lifestyle of Amish Christians, can be well discussed within the context of how it promotes the idea that people are naturally inclined to seek the sensation of ‘belongingness’.
Therefore, this film can be referred to as being ‘sociologically insightful’, as well, because after having watched it, viewers would be likely to come to the following set of conclusions, in regards to both: the very nature of a religious belief, as ‘thing in itself’, and this belief’s societal implications:
a) The more a particular individual happened to be religious, the more there are absurdist overtones to his or her existential stance. As it was shown in the documentary, Amish believers make a deliberate point in not taking a practical advantage of modern technologies. For example, they do not watch television. Instead of using cars, as the mean of transportation, they use horse-drawn carriages. The Amish justify such their lifestyle by referring to the Bible, in which Jesus prescribed true Christians to practice a ‘simple living’.
This points out to the fact that it is in the very nature of just about any monotheistic religion to strive to slow down the pace of a socio-cultural and technological progress. The reason for this is apparent – while being incapable of helping people to address the challenges of a contemporary living, religion has no other option but to try undermining the discursive soundness of what does provide people with the immediately felt life-enhancing benefits – science.
Given the fact that the U.S. is considered one of the most scientifically advanced countries in the world (which explains the high standards of living in this country), Amish believers could not think of anything better than secluding themselves within the communities of mind-likes, and proceeding to live as if they were ‘petrified’ in time.
b) Contrary to what it is being commonly assumed, one’s strongly religious upbringing creates objective preconditions for the concerned individual to end up choosing in favor of a strongly anti-social behavioral mode. According to the Amish tradition, after having reached the age of 16, the community’s teenagers (born and raised among the Amish) are allowed to travel to the ‘English’ world and to try what it is like living without having ‘God’ standing behind their backs 24/7.
Predictably enough, the majority of these teenagers end up being hooked on alcohol and drugs – while unaccustomed to the ways of the real world, these youngsters do not fully realize the actual implications of a drug/alcohol abuse.
This can also be explained by the fact that, while living in the Amish community, young people are forced to suppress their sexual desires. Therefore, when ‘out on the loose’, they naturally tend to act in the ‘hyper-sexual’ manner – alcohol and drugs come in particularly handy, in this respect.
Consequently, this eventually leads many of them to decide in favor of returning back to the Amish community and giving up on secular lifestyles, as ‘innately wicked’. In other words, the Amish community’s continual functioning is ‘fueled’ by the destroyed lives of young people, who were unfortunate enough to be born in the families of the perceptually arrogant Bible-thumpers.
c) One’s conscious choice plays an insignificant role, within the context of how he or she decides to affiliate itself with a particular group of people. As it was shown in the video, the Amish intentionally allow their teenagers to savor the taste of a secular life.
This is because; the community leaders want to rule out the possibility for ‘unfit’ individuals to be able to join the Church. The extent of one’s ‘fitness’ in this respect, is being evaluated in regards to the tested individual’s ability to remain arrogant, as to the fact that the Amish are nothing short of degenerates, in both: physiological and psychological senses of this word.
In its turn, this explains why the physical appearance of the interviewed young members of the Church (those that decided to return to the Amish community), bears the strongly defined marks of an anthropological atavism – bulging eyes, low foreheads, bad teeth and skin. This, of course, suggests that one’s willingness to join the Amish community is rather genetically then environmentally predetermined.
Conclusion
The earlier discussed documentaries confirm the validity of the suggestion that, in order for sociology to remain a discursively legitimate social science, its methodological apparatus must be observant of what are the biological determinants of people’s affiliation with a particular social group/organization/religion.
The reason for this is apparent – in light of recent discoveries in the fields of genetics and sociobiology, the qualitative aspects of how people go about addressing life-challenges, reflected by their socialization-related tendencies, appear to be genetically prearranged. As Dawkins noted: “We are all survival machines for the same kind of replicator – molecules called DNA” (21).
There are no ‘good’ or ‘bad’ genes, but only the ones that succeed in ensuring the survival of its replicas, and the ones that do not. Given the fact that genes have long ago been confirmed to define just about all the qualitative aspects of one’s behavior, there is nothing particularly odd about the fact that people are being naturally driven to socialize with those, whose their sub-consciousness deems genetically similar – even if this is far from being the actual case.
This is because, while in the company of mind-likes, people are more likely to predict the behavior of other group-members, with which they may end up competing for the same resource. In its turn, this explains why, as it was shown in People like us: Social class in America, those considered ‘old money’ do not seem to tolerate ‘new money’ people, while often denying them the prospect of being accepted socially.
The same thesis can be applied, when it comes to explaining the socialization-related tendencies, on the part of ‘rednecks’. Apparently, these people’s very genes ‘tell’ them that there is nothing purely accidental about their low social status, and that they would be much more likely to succeed in ‘spreading the seed’, while remaining within the boundaries of their class.
After all, the hypothetical attempt to attain a social prominence, on the part of a ‘redneck’, would be automatically perceived by the rich and powerful, as a threat to their own well-being – hence, potentially causing the latter to consider killing the newly emerged competitor.
This also explains why, as it was implied in The Devil’s playground, in order for people to be qualified to join the Amish community, they should not be merely familiar with the Biblical fables and emotionally comfortable with the community’s rules, but they in fact must be arrogant enough to think of these fables, as such that represent an undisputed truth-value.
Allegorically speaking, one’s de facto legibility to join the Amish Church is being reflective of the concerned individual’s endowment with the ‘gene of stupidity’. I believe that this conclusion correlates with the paper’s initial thesis.
References
Cnam2000. (2009). People like us: Social class in America [Video file]. Web.
Dawkins, R. (1976). The selfish gene. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Lasrever. (2008). The Devil’s playground [Video file]. Web.