Deviance

Deviance is a failure, willful or otherwise, to conform to the rules observed by the majority members of the group. The group reacts by accusing the person/s of having offended the social or moral norms of behavior. The power of any group is its ability to designate a breach of their rules as deviant and to treat the person/s differently depending on the level of the breach.


Societies ultimately determine who or what is deviant thru majority rule. This is the true power which determines one set of beliefs, values or ideas over another. Our current political struggles are clearly about who will wield the power to determine who is deviant and who isn't.

Homosexuality is often decried as immoral and deviant by certain segments of our society. The reasoning used to determine homosexuality as deviant is flawed and unsupported by any valid research; however it isn't research that ultimatley determines deviance in a group.

The disagreements between those who say one thing is immoral and others who say it isn't is often described as a war between the righteous and unrighteous. Sometimes it is characterized as a fight against good and evil. The "good" folks being of a certain group and the "evil" folks of another. Are people so easily defined? Some would have us think so, but most of us know this to be false.

What was once considered deviant 100 years ago may very well be thought of as moral or irrelevant today. Those same people who proclaim themselves to be on the side of "good" today may well have been labeled evil a century ago. Are we really so naive to think our traditions and values will remain static? Do we not see the arrogance in some of our societies current beliefs and values?

Bill J.