American Deviants

American Deviants

Assignment #4
Chris Porter
College of Lake County
12/16/2013







Abstract
Many of us take for granted that those who have been labeled as a deviant are a different kind of people than the majority of us. This belief has been strengthen by the stereotypical images of crime, and deviants, by the mass media, which has portrayed offenders of the society as immoral, impulsive, or mentally insane. The distinction between the “deviants” and the “normal’s” and them trying to separate the two is a fallacy. Deviance is not a distinguishing trait, deviance is a label given to certain people because those who have the power to do so can. All people have the capacity to engage in behavior that has been labeled as deviant by a larger society.
















What are normal’s Goffman says that a stigma is something that detracts from a person, and that “normal' people cannot ignore. It is something that makes them less than human, and normal people make up reasons to explain their inferiority and the danger they present to them the “normal’s”. Goffman said a stigmatized person may believe that they are “normal' and feels they are entitled to a fair chance just like everyone else. At the same time, in the presence of “normal” people, they realize that they are different and cannot do what they can, and this causes them to feel shame, and can lead to self-hate and self-degradation.
Goffman identifies three types of stigma; there are the stigma of character traits, physical stigma, and stigma of group identity. The Stigma of a character traits are flaws in a individuals character and can be perceived as weak willed, domineering, or unnatural passions, treachery or strong beliefs, and dishonesty, these being from a known record like, mental disorder, imprisonment, addiction, alcoholism, homosexuality ,unemployment, suicidal attempts, and radical political behavior.” A Physical stigma is a physical deformity of...

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