Essay 2 ENGL-118

Ho Gung Hiu
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INTRO + THESIS:
It is an obvious fact that social norms are a major part of the daily life, as an adult and even as a
teenager. Each and every one of us has to follow the norm, because social norms are a group of
cultures that the majority believe. As a result, they can either benefit or harm our society in
different ways. In other words, social norms help us to create order in our society, and they help
us to judge the appropriateness of our own behaviors. Because we have such a need for those
benefits, we may need to face prejudice if we break the norms. In fact, this tendency to reject
norm breakers is part of the problem created by social norms. Precisely, social norms cause
problems like: create friction for change and affect our judgment.
FIRST BENEFIT:
First and foremost, social norms help us to maintain stability in our society. For example, norm
makes us to wait in line without having a staff to tell us to line up. Saul McLeod is a psychology
lecture at university of Manchester. In his article called Social Roles, which addressed the
benefit of having social norms, McLeod argues that social norms can create order in society. He
says, it is difficult to see how human society could operate without them. How would we know
the right ways to behave? How would we know that what to expect in a particular social situation?
The short answer is that we wouldnt (McLeod 1). Also, in his article The norms of social
roles and conformity. He mentioned an experiment, which was done by a social psychologist
who named Phillip Zimbardo in 1973, studied the norms between prisoner and guard. He
concludes, The prisoners soon fell into their expected role, too, adopting prisoner-like behavior.
For example, they told tales on each other to the guards, and they started taking the prison rules
very seriously (McLeod 3). In other words, McLeod says that norm exists in an environment,
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people will adapt and follow the norm, which created an intangible force to prevent people
violate the norm. And that force will eventually become an order in our society. This is
significant because if norm doesnt exist, and if there is no rule to restrict what we are supposed
not to do, then it will create a lot of chaos, like the lining up problem that I mentioned which
destroys the social harmony.

SECOND BENEFIT:
Another benefit of having social norms is that they help us to censor our behavior. For example,
even if you are angry with your parents, and you want to say foul language to your parents, you
wouldnt do it, because your mind told you that is inappropriate. And why your mind will have a
such concept? It is because you are restricted by the norms. Adam Corner is the research
Director for the Climate Outreach & Information Network (COIN) and an Honorary Research
Fellow in the School of Psychology, Cardiff University. In his article called Social Norm
Strategies Do Work-but with Risks, which talks about the relationship between behavior and
social norms. He argues that social norms help us to judge the appropriateness of our own
behavior. He says, In laboratory studies and other, more practical settings, providing people
with evidence of what others around them are doing has been shown to have a significant effect
on behavior (Corner 2). Another people who shares this point of view is Saul McLeod, in his
article Social Roles, he says there are norms defining appropriate behavior for every social
group. For example, students, neighbors and patients in a hospital are all aware of the norms
governing behavior (McLeod 1). In other words, both authors agree that, social norms will
remind individual what they should or should not do, which foster people to think twice before
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they act. This is significant because if norm does not exist in our world, we wont judge our
behavior, then it will create tons of conflicts which can be avoided easily. Just as you couldn't
tell what is wrong with your face without using a mirror, you wont know what you should or
should not do if norm does not exist in your mind.

THE CONSEQUENCE OF BREAKING SOCIAL NORMS
As a consequence, people breaking the norms will suffer from prejudice. For example, in India,
eating food with hands is extremely common and appropriate. In contrast, using tableware to eat
is the norms that western society advocates, therefore, if you use hands to eat steak in a
restaurant, you will be labeled as unhygienic, uneducated and crazy. One place we see this is in a
novel called The Stranger by Albert Camus. This novel is about a man who has a trouble
following social norms. At one point the main character was counselling with his attorney. And
even though he was willing to cooperate with his attorney, his attorney hates him because of his
odd behavior in his mother's funeral. Meursault says, [the lawyer] asked me if he could say that
that day I had held back my natural feelings. I said, No, because its not true. He gave me a
strange look, as if he found me slightly disgusting (Camus 65). Another moment that shares this
point of view is the accusation that made by his prosecutor: even though there is not enough
evidence to charge him with this murder, the prosecutor used his odd behavior as his evidence to
charge the main character. The prosecutor says, I accuse this man of burying his mother with
crime in his heart! (Camus 96). In other words, these two examples tell us that in our society,
people follow the norms no matter they are good or not. Therefore, if a person broke the norms,
people who follow the norms will give him a hard time because they have to do something to
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protect the norms that they believe. This draws a significant impact on our society because of the
people who are willing to follow the norms also mean that they agree the norms are always right.
But this is not always true, sometimes the norms are wrong, and when people broke those norms,
he still needs to suffer from the negative actions toward him.

FIRST PROBLEM:
One challenge of having social norms is that they will create unnecessary restrictions for our
actions. For example, even if we want to tell a person that he made an error, we cant tell them
directly because this is rude in our society. Therefore, we have to tell them euphemistically,
which is less effective to deliver our real message. One place we can see this is in the novel The
Stranger. At one point, the main character felt embarrassed for not willing to unscrew the casket
even though he has the right for not doing that. The book says, He was quiet, and I was
embarrassed because I felt I shouldnt have said that (Camus 20). Another moment that
supports this idea is the conversation between the main character and his girlfriend. Even though
they want to go out and have a date, the atmosphere got destroyed by the fact that the main
character was in mourning. Meursault said, I told her Maman had died. She wanted to know
how long ago, so I said, Yesterday. She gave a little start, but didnt say anything (Camus 20).
In other words, both examples say if our action conflicts with the social norms, then our action
will be limited, even if it is logically right. It is a huge challenge for our society, because social
norms supposed to act like a tool to help us to create order in our society and guide our action.
However, sometimes the relationship between society and the social norms got inverted. More
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often than not, social norms restricted our flexibility and limited our responds in different
situations.

Second Challenge:
Another challenge of having social norms is that they will affect our judgment. For example,
showing your tattoo in a job interview may affect your image on your interviewer, even though a
tattoo doesnt reflect your ability, but in our society, the tattoo is often considered as a symbol of
rebellion. One place we can see this is in the novel. At one point the main character was on trial
of a murder. The prosecutor used Meursaults odd behavior as the evidence to charge him, even
though his behavior doesnt have anything to deal with the crime. The prosecutor says, the same
man who, the day after his mother died was indulging in the most shameful debauchery killed a
man for the most trivial of reasons and did so in order to settle an affair of unspeakable vice
(Camus 96). Another example, which shares this point of view is in our society. It is a norm that
we use bookends and files to store our documents. In contrast, some people actually prefer
stacking their document in their workplace because they find that is helpful for them to find
things that they want. However, for those who prefer this way, often make people feel that they
are lazy and dont take their job seriously. In other words, both examples say that for the people
who follow the norms often use the norms as a model to shape the norm breakers. And during
this process, misjudgment may occur due to the fact that norms are not always true. The is a
serious problem, because if people only judge people based on the norms that they trust without
thinking the logic behind the problem, then to shape others behavior may bring negative
feedback to our society. Just as you couldnt determine whether an answer is correct or not if you
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just listen to others say and expect your decision is always right, we cant judge people only
based on the norms and expect the our judgment is always right.

Conclusion:
It is a solid fact that social norms can bring benefits to our society. Without social norms, our
society wont have such high stability, and people will make more mistakes because there is no
mechanism to help us judge our behavior. However, social norm is a double edge sword. Getting
too much help from the norms will hinder our creativity and affect our judgment. Therefore,
society should strike a balance on social norms to prevent the norms controlling us rather than
controlling the norms.