Constructing Deviance continuation

Constructing Deviance continuation

1. Claimsmakers

   • Compete in a social problems makertplace, each seeking to arouse concert about particular issues from the press the public, and policymakers.
     • Claimsmakers assemble claims that feature a variety of rethorical elements-statistics, expert opinions, and appeals.
   • Blowback
     • Unanticipated, negative consequences of social action. Organizations, institutions and individuals with good reputations can be susceptible.
   • Claimsmaking rhetoric
     • How claimsmakers use reputation to construct social problems.

2. Good Reputation

   • Thought to convey advantages; with their holders receiving the benefit of the doubt. For example, “halo effect” or “Matthew effect” (Merton, 1968). Codified in high grade point averages, impressive resumes, good credit ratings, etc. Open doors for individuals that remain closed to those of more questionable repute.

3. Bad Reputation

   • In general, bad reputations increase one’s vulnerability to having opportunities blocked, to being subjected to tighter social control, to have one’s future actions framed in terms of the reputation, or to other disadvantages.

4. Legitimated Suppression

   • 1.Legitimated profiling
     • Police officers focused on making stops based on the legal justification of reasonable suspicion and probable cause.
   • 2.Interacting with suspected gang members.
     • Interactions between police and Mexican-American community members is very tense because of vagueness of encounters and their unknown outcomes. Police often lacked for a reason to interact with, search, or arrest the urban youth they stopped, they commonly attempted to incite provocations to justify a search or arrest.
   • 3.Intelligence gathering
     • A key component of police suppression tactics. Includes creating gang lists based on coercive tactics or informal/nonchalant exchanges between suspected gang members and police.
   • 4.Serious forms of police misconduct.
     • Use of excessive force. Illegal immigrants treated worse.Most (80%) of misconduct occurred during an arrest and in an isolated area during evening hours.

5. Homophobia and women's sports

   • Not all individuals engage in behavior consistent with gender expectations.
     • Women's violation of traditional gender role norms represents a particularly serious threat to the patriarchal and heterosexist society.
       • Lesbianism is a strong threat, since it challenges heterosexual family structure, and female dependence on men for economic, emotional, and sexual needs.
   • Homophobic controls include frequent application of lesbian label to women who move into traditional male-dominated fields, such as politics, business or military.
   • Sport represents another area where women have made significant strides. As a result they have become potential targets of such negative labels and innuendo.
     • Sport a critical area for lesbian baiting due to traditional linkage of males and athleticism: Women who play sports violate docile female gender role norms.

6. The mark of a criminal record

   • At least one contributing factor is that incarceration is associated with limited future employment and earnings.
     • Little or no previous research has explored racial differences in effects of incarceration on such things as employment.
       • Incarceration rate for black men in 2000, was 10% versus 1% for whites.

7. The "Protective cloak" of physicians

   • Recognized as a privileged caste able to heal the sick, a privilege won through difficult years of education & exhaustive training.
     • Attributes connected with medical practice
       • Affords doctors protection necessary to commit crime.
   • Status
   • Altruism
     • Physicians altruistic image engenders trust from patients who can become easy targets of fraud or to overlook negligent medical care.
     • Rooted in code of ethics which defines doctors as selfless professionals who perform invaluable service without regard for personal gain.
   • Autonomy
     • Doctors have been relatively immune to legal scrutiny because of medical professions’ preference for self-regulation.
     • Members of the professional group are presumed to be in the best position to identify misconduct within the group, are also qualified to judge the scope of misconduct and adjudicate appropriate penalties.