Wednesday, September 08, 2004
How the normal became deviant
If you wonder how come it is very difficult these days to say what "normal" is, and how come society standards are in a shambles, I offer the insights of Charles Krauthammer. In a classic essay written in 2000 (but which I have only just discovered), Krauthammer says we are being subjected to a vast social project of moral leveling, in which the deviant is being normalized, and the normal is being redefined as deviant.
"While for the criminals and the crazies deviancy has been defined down (the bar defining normality has been lowered), for the ordinary bourgeois deviancy has been defined up (the bar defining normality has been raised). Large areas of ordinary behavior hitherto considered benign have had their threshold radically redefined up, so that once innocent behavior now stands condemned as deviant. Normal middle class life then stands exposed as the true home of violence, abuse, misogyny, a whole of catalog deviant acting and thinking.
"As part of this project of moral leveling, whole new areas of deviancy--such as date rape and politically incorrect speech--have been discovered. And old areas--such as child abuse--have been amplified by endless reiteration in the public presses and validated by learned reports of their astonishing frequency. The net effect is to show that deviancy is not the province of criminals and crazies but thrives in the heart of the great middle class. The real deviants of society stand unmasked. Who are they? Not Bonnie and Clyde but Ozzie and Harriet.
"The moral deconstruction of middle class normality is a vast project. Fortunately, it has thousands of volunteers working on the case. By defining deviancy up they have scored some notable successes. Three, in particular. And in precisely the same three areas Moynihan identified: family life, crime, and mental illness."
The full article can be read here.
If you wonder how come it is very difficult these days to say what "normal" is, and how come society standards are in a shambles, I offer the insights of Charles Krauthammer. In a classic essay written in 2000 (but which I have only just discovered), Krauthammer says we are being subjected to a vast social project of moral leveling, in which the deviant is being normalized, and the normal is being redefined as deviant.
"While for the criminals and the crazies deviancy has been defined down (the bar defining normality has been lowered), for the ordinary bourgeois deviancy has been defined up (the bar defining normality has been raised). Large areas of ordinary behavior hitherto considered benign have had their threshold radically redefined up, so that once innocent behavior now stands condemned as deviant. Normal middle class life then stands exposed as the true home of violence, abuse, misogyny, a whole of catalog deviant acting and thinking.
"As part of this project of moral leveling, whole new areas of deviancy--such as date rape and politically incorrect speech--have been discovered. And old areas--such as child abuse--have been amplified by endless reiteration in the public presses and validated by learned reports of their astonishing frequency. The net effect is to show that deviancy is not the province of criminals and crazies but thrives in the heart of the great middle class. The real deviants of society stand unmasked. Who are they? Not Bonnie and Clyde but Ozzie and Harriet.
"The moral deconstruction of middle class normality is a vast project. Fortunately, it has thousands of volunteers working on the case. By defining deviancy up they have scored some notable successes. Three, in particular. And in precisely the same three areas Moynihan identified: family life, crime, and mental illness."
The full article can be read here.
