Response to Should or Shouldn't Parents Divorce?

By researching about this topic, I found out that socialization again plays a role in a child life. When parents divorce, the child tends to follow the path of his parents. Research shows that child of divorced parents tend to divorce in his marriage later on. The impacts of divorce to the children show socialization. Broken family disturbs the children’s studies and psychological attitudes. The parents will spend less time with their children when they divorce and thus the children get less guidance and company throughout their childhood. With less guidance they often get tangled in crimes and social issues. Whatever the parents do, it will affect the children.

Should or Shouldn’t Parents Divorce?

People want to create bonds with their loved one and thus they commit to live together forever under a term which we call “marriage”. However, obstacles always come and depending on how the couples react to these problems, whether or not they can keep their marriage intact. But it is not easy to maintain their status of marriage as sometimes the obstacles are unmanageable and the next thing they consider to do is to divorce. Although divorce is inevitable in some cases but the impacts are unavoidable. Divorce for couples with children will give more negative impacts to the family. Parents should consider the negative results of divorcing because in most cases, the impacts of divorcing outweigh the benefit of it which raise a question in people’s mind that is, “should or shouldn’t couples divorce?”.
According to an article “The Top 10 Reasons for Divorce” there are top ten reasons why couple divorce. One of the most common reasons is “infidelity” in marriage where there is a third person in the relationship by means one of the couple cannot maintain his/her faith for the spouse. There are many other reasons that break a family apart such as “communication breakdown, physical, psychological or emotional abuse, financial issues, sexual incompatibility, boredom, religious and cultural strains, child rearing, addiction, differences in priorities and expectations”. These reasons drive people to lose their control of their emotions and end up hurting each other. In that case, divorcing is the first thing that appears in their mind.
Woman employment can also lead to unstable relationship between couples which might result in divorce. According to the article “Women's employment, marital happiness, and divorce”, women employment decrease the stability of marriage despite of the high utility the family can get by receiving additional income because “the economic opportunity hypothesis asserts that labor force participation does not undermine happy marriages but gives women the resources to escape unhappy marriages”. Getting extra money is tempting to many women and makes them choose to entangle themselves in employment to have money to be spent on materialistic. But employment can make them lost their focus in marriage which will create dispute within couples as people believe that the most stable marriages are those that follow the role of exchange such that “the wife exchanges her domestic services (including childbearing) for the husband's economic support and vice versa”. Mothers will spend less time with their children and more likely to abandon them when they work. This action is prone to leading them to social issues like drugs which might result in family problem. Parents will fight and start blaming each other when their children are tangled in social issues. This will lead them to a choice of divorcing.
There are chances that divorce might lead them to depression because of the negative impacts that is dominating. Quarrelling in marriage is inevitable but people have choices whether to let their anger and disappointment lead them to a dead end where depression, poverty, unemployment, health problem and the destruction of their children psychology meets them which will be discussed soon. Divorce will not only cause pain to the couples but also to the children and this is the reason why parents should deliberate upon their choices.
There is no way that divorce doesn’t affect the work life of people. The couples that have decided to divorce need to spend a lot of time and money in finding lawyers. Moreover one of them will need to take care of their children by him/herself as written in “Employees' Divorce Harms Employers” that “they typically spend a large amount of time and energy finding a lawyer, revising household budgets, looking for a new place to live and making child care arrangements”. A study by Richard Mueller, a researcher at the University of Lethbridge in Alberta, Canada discovered that “in the year after a divorce, employees lost an average of more than 168 hours of work time”. This will affect the efficiency of the workers and when they get too inefficient, they are at the stake of losing their jobs which will give extra suffering.
When parents divorce, it goes to the worst for the children. Now both parents have to divide their finance individually and get lesser income comparing to when they join their salaries and thus they might suffer from poverty. According to the article “Single-Parent Families Are More Likely to Be Poor”, there was a study in University of Michigan that proved that divorce has resulted in nearly 50% decrease in yearly income. The study shows that “during the years children lived with two parents, their family incomes averaged $43,600, and when these same children lived with one parent, their family incomes averaged $25,300”. When the parents divorce, in some cases one of the parents stop to provide the needs for the other parent and thus he/she needs to support his/her children alone. The children that experience a sudden drop in financial status might have a higher probability to commit crimes because of the society pressure.
Working is time consuming and a lot more works are waiting ahead of the divorced parents which cause the children to spend more time with other people than with their biological parents. Dangerously the children are prone to getting physical abuse when their parents rely the lives of their children on others which according to the article “Broken Homes Increase the Risk of Child Abuse”, children often suffer from “homicide, rape, aggravated assault and other offenses” from other people because nobody is giving attention to them and the parents themselves do not know what is happening to their children when they ask somebody else to take care of them. There was a case written in the same article where “a 7-year-old North Side girl was beaten and burned more than 37 times with cigarettes with her uncle, who was living with the family and babysitting the first-grader and her siblings”. After knowing this case, you might want to deliberate on a question “are you ready to trust your children’s lives on others?”.
Spending lesser time with their parents, children tend to entangle in social issue because they have less attention and guidance. In the article “Parents Should Be Held Legally Responsible for Juvenile Crime”, the author “believes that parents who fail to adequately monitor their children's behavior ought to be held legally responsible when those children commit crimes”. Children need direction in their lives and when their parents divorce, the workload for each parents increase as they will need to manage their lives individually and so they will spend less time monitoring their children. In the article “Single Parenthood Increases the Risk of Juvenile Crime”, it states that “two parents can supervise the child's behavior more readily than one. Misbehavior can continue undetected and uncorrected for longer periods of time [in a single-parent household] until it becomes more severe and more difficult to manage”. The children can entangle themselves in gangs and drug abuse without their parents knowing when they spend little time with their parents. Father and mothers in intact families can take turn to look after their children as they have lesser workload to do when they can divide the work together, whereas in broken family, fathers and mothers need to work individually to earn for a living, leaving their children with less guidance.
Some parents are fighting for their children which in the end up dividing the time equally and make the children move weekly from one to another house. It is depressing for the children to be treated as objects. In an interview in the article “Joint Physical Custody Creates Problems for Children”, a 14 year old said, “If you're constantly moving you feel a bit lonely”. They feel lonely because they have two lives at a time and they often jumble up their different lives at different houses as another child complained, “I was getting mixed up about who I was”. Moreover each person has different parenting styles which often confuse the children. Mother and father treat their children differently and it tortures the children as a mother said, “it's all very well having their dad do things differently if it's once a month, as a treat, but living two completely opposite lifestyles tore the children in half”. They need to adjust to the parenting styles every week, the cycle that frequently happen is enjoying the freedom for one week in one house and back to another strict home regulation in another.
Beyond what is visible at the moment, people are unable to see the long-term effect of divorce that might disturb people’s healthiness. According to a study in Chicago it involves “8,652 people aged 51 to 61 found divorced people have 20% more chronic illnesses such as cancer than those who never marry”. It is more than just psychological problem which can be cured with time. The stress, depression and pressure from the divorce situation can damage people’s health. Moreover, remarry will not prevent and cure the diseases. According to an article “Divorce takes health toll that remarriage can't heal” in CNN news website, they “found that divorced or widowed people have 20 percent more chronic health conditions such as heart disease, diabetes or cancer than married people”. Unlike psychological problem that can be cured by remarriage, the psychological pressures from the situation itself create health problems in the future which is incurable.
Similar to many issues, there are many ways to see them. Beyond the disadvantages, people argue that divorce can be a good solution. When the studies show that divorce might make the children end up being delinquents, people oppose it by finding out that most of the massive destructions of children come even before the parents divorce and those children belong to a non harmony family where their parents fight frequently. A friend of mine admit that she prefer her parents to separate rather than fighting every night which makes her cannot feel at home. Fighting parents might render the children to frustration state and do not feel at home thus they will go out and find the place where they can feel better. Unfortunately, often times they find wrong places and commit to gangs. Intact family is not a guarantee to a peaceful home which can prevent the psychology destruction of the children. In this case, divorce can be the best solution for the children because they can have a more peaceful home when they parents are not together.
It is a very difficult option of parents to make when it comes to marriage. When a husband or wife creates troubles for the family and there is no way to stop it, divorce can be a good choice. I have a friend whose father couldn’t keep his faith in the marriage and did polygamy, rendering her mother to a deep state of depression which cause the children to be abandoned. She couldn’t do anything as everything she did will cause her to suffer from physical abuse from her husband. The law in my country, Indonesia, is not strong enough to help her from the abuse. The tremendous affliction that she carried all these time made her felt the anticlimax which caused her to give up on her children and didn’t want to do anything. Thus her mother relinquished the family, including her children because of the pain that she felt for years and years. The youngest son went rebellious seeing his mother didn’t care about him. The children have no role model in their lives to have a father who rarely went home and a mother who locked herself in the room abandoning her children. Money is not a problem for this family and keeping the marriage and divorce will only differ in the financial status. Her mother will need to work and earn for a living if she divorce and rearing three children by herself is not an easy thing. Moreover, whatever she does will not result in a better financial status than she is right now when her husband is supporting her life. If the case come to a point where neither divorce nor keeping the marriage work, what should parents do? In either divorcing or keeping the marriage, the couples have to change themselves. If the mother knows that she will not survive when she divorces she should accept her husband’s infidelity and stop mourning over her life. If she chooses to divorce then she should consider the opportunity cost of divorcing.
In general, it is impossible to find a smooth marriage without obstacle. Wisely, parents have to be selfless for their children but keep striving for their own happiness and this is when their most difficult question of their lives arises. What action should they take? Divorcing but gambling their children’s happiness? Or keep their marriage but have no peace at home? As we can see, impacts from divorcing are a lot more than the impacts of keeping the marriage. Parents have to consider prudently the cost and benefit and wisely choose which path to take. So which path will you take?

Response to Crimes Are Explained by Four Theories

From this essay I learned about the four theories. I also learned that if the environment is supportive for crimes, the criminals will take the chance to do crimes. Like the theory of broken window which states that when they leave a broken window in public, there were higher rate of crimes comparing to leaving normal window which shows that when the environment has the supportive condition to do crime, then there happens a crime. From this the socialization is obvious. Whatever the conditions of our societies are, they will affect our behaviors in that society.

Response to Our Personalities Are Dependent on Our Societies

Farmworker’s Daughter helps me to understand more about the dependency of our personalities to our societies. Rose was grown up in an uneasy environment where she had to suffer from many problems. I believe that was what made Rose strong. Her society forced her to work in her young age which made her a hardworking girl. Unlike other children at her young age at that time, she didn’t play much and didn’t complain a lot. She was acceptance to her condition. Being unable to do anything in her condition, she was taught to be acceptance to her life.

Response to Adult Prison VS Juvenile System

After reading the novel “True Notebooks”, I realized that everything that happens is the result of socialization. The delinquents come from the backgrounds that support their behaviors. Broken families, poor societies, pressure from the societies, bad influences are the most common reasons for them to join crimes. From the first time I learned about sociology, I began to realize that everything is related to our society. How good or bad our societies are reflected from our behaviors. I learned that young criminals need guidance to get through their punishment.

Response to What Makes The Identity

I learned a lot about socialization. There are different types of socialization, primary and secondary. I learned that our “self” is dependent on our society. The bad and the good things in our societies will mold us into ourselves. Primary socialization happens when we are young. We are like white paper when we are young, the societies will write on the paper and we will internalize whatever they write into ourselves forever so primary socialization is very important. After we finish the primary socialization we will go to the next step that is secondary socialization. This process is the adaptation of ourselves to our societies after we grow up. I realize that my family makes me into myself. All the things that they forbid me from doing make me know what is right and wrong and now I apply what I believe is right to my daily life. When I think back into the past I realize that all the problems in my society makes me stronger and wiser. My conservative family makes me have a conservative thought. Whatever my parents did to me affect my personalities. My family norms are passed down to me and I apply it to my daily life. My believes and perspectives come from the environment I grew up. My society helps me to see things in my way.

Crimes Are Explained By Four Theories

We are living in the world full of deviance. Everybody does deviant behavior with no exception. But some people do indecent behaviors that are against the law, in other words, they are harmful or disadvantaging other people. These behaviors fall into crime category. In “Theories of Crime and “Code Of The Streets” by Elija Anderson and “Conformity, Deviance, and Crime” by Giddens, they discuss about theories of Crime and what makes people do crime. There are four sociological theories of crime, that is, Followed by interactionist theories that imply that the society condition renders people to fall into criminals category. The theories are: functionalist theories, interactionist theories, conflict theory, control theory. People often divide themselves into “decent” and “street” categories. Decent people are the one that live their live heathily, accepting lives’ fact without doing any crime whereas street people are incapable of accepting themselves and thus become criminals. Many children grow up in lack-of-concerned type of family, they got little guidance when they are young that cause them to behave in different path and do crime when they grow up and fall into street people category. This is mentioned in the “Functionalist theories” which say that “functionalist theories see crime and deviance resulting from structural tensions and a lack of moral regulation within society”(Giddens 158) When children got lack of moral educations in their young age, they will not be prudent enough to solve their problem in non-deviant way. When the society in which they grow up put them in pressures of economical status or restrict them from accomplishing their dreams, they will not be able to accept their lives and thus do crime to fulfill their needs. “Lack of opportunity for success in the terms of the wider society is the main differentiating factor between those who engage in criminal behavior and those who do not”(Giddens 160). People often become jealous with others who have more than them and this jealousy cause them to destroy others’ possession or to achieve their success using a shortcut that is to do crime. The street people often maintain their respect by not wanting people to have more than them. They do this by stealing as Elijah mentions that “one way of campaigning for status is by taking the possessions of others” (53). In opposition to the decent family which “tend to be strict in their child-rearing practices, encouraging children to respect authority and walk a straight moral line”(Elijah 51). Parents that guide their children in a straight line make their children solve problem in wiser way rather than using violence and do crimes. The society in which we grow up affect our behaviors. When children grew up in indecent society, they will tend to follow the indecent behavior of people in their society. This lead them to do crime more than those who grow up in decent family as mention in “Interactionist Theories”. The theories say that “criminal behavior is learned within primary groups, particularly peer groups” (Giddens 160). When the people do crimes in which the children grow up, they are prone to do crime as well. How the society see things will affect the perspective of these children. Elijah mentions that physical appearance is one of the “code of street”, the rule in which street people follow to maintain their pride and respect. People have their own style of clothing but mostly they follow others as Elijah mentions that physical appearance “is shaped by what he thinks others are thinking of him in relation to his peers (53). Man often overrepresented as very strong than woman. All of these thinking come from the society in which a child grew up. When the society mold them wrongly, they will stick to their childhood thought until they grow up. Sometimes people act unfairly to each other because of financial, background, race, gender differences. The discriminations that people experience force them to do crimes. The theory behind this behavior is called “Conflict Theory”. “Individuals actively choose to engage in deviant behavior in response to the inequalities of the capitalist system” (Giddens 161). The decent family often have prejudice towards the street family which cause them to suffer from discriminations as Elijah mentions “These decent people are trying hard to be part of the mainstream culture, but the racism, real and perceived, that they encounter helps to legitimate the oppositional culture” (56). People feel the unfairness and they are losing the priviledge in many things because of their social status and thus they commit crime. Criminals often do crimes whenever they see the opportunity of doing this is mention in “Control Theory”. “Delinquents are often individuals whose low levels of self-control are a result of inadequate socialization at home or at school” (Giddens 162). When parents give less control to their children, they have more freedom in conducting deviant behaviors. As small kids are like blank papers, when they do mistakes and nobody correct them and restrict them from doing, they will keep doing it. Crimes are very common in our daily lives because of lack of control from the government and society as mentions by Elijah that “The code of the streets is actually a cultural adaptation to a profound lack of faith in the police and the judicial system” (50). The control from the government is not enough that there are a lot of wide hole for the criminals to maneuver in and commit crimes. In the theory of “Broken Windows”, “Studies have shown that proactive policing directed at maintaing public order can have a positive effect on reducing more serious crimes such as robbery” (Giddens 163). If we give more attention to the society and put more securities in places, the rate of crime will decrease as they have less chance in doing the crimes. Elijah writes a lot of “Interactionist Theories” in the readings. She gives a lot of examples of how society mold people up to become criminals. How the society see us will make us see others in the same way so we behave in the way that the society accept us. If the society thinks that man is more powerful than woman then the people will overrepresent man. How important people think about respect will make them behave in different ways to maintain their pride. How people think about appearance will form a new style, which the people in the society followed. I personally think that “Interactionist Theories” are explaining crimes the best. We do things by following others when we were young. If others do things improperly, we will act indecently. How people see things will make us see things in that way. Children do things initially by learning and following others. So how the society behaves will affect how we behave.

Adult Prison VS Juvenile System

Crimes have been a part of our societies. It is common for us to see adolescents behave in an improper way that is harmful to others which makes us label them as criminals. There are numerous youngsters who are locked up in the prisons. The government has divided the prisons into two categories, adult and juvenile. Debates have been brought up as to whether to charge the youngsters to juvenile or adult court. Some judges are ironically unjust to these youngsters by sending them straight away to adult court without giving any parole. After reading the “True Notebook” by Mark Salzman, I believe that the juvenile system is more beneficial to the youngsters as they provide useful knowledge and psychological needs that can help them to change rather than sending them to adult jail.
From the “True Notebook”, I realized that the background societies the criminals came from were leading them towards a life of crime. All of them faced a harsh environment where they have to feel loneliness, dilemma, rejection, unfairness. Many of them suffered from low financial status. Victor, one of the students, was sulking about the judges saying that “they don’t know what it’s like when there is nothing to eat when you come home from school” (290). He grew up in a poor family and he felt that nobody understood him. Some said that they were lost in their lives and found that becoming a part of a gang is cool and respectable. I believe many teenagers have the same thought like Patrick Chumnikai, one of the criminals in the novel, who said “I felt different. I was from a gang now. I felt like I had power. People would fear me and my friends when we went into places” (94). Many teenagers want to show they have power over something. They want to gain respect from others and manipulate people who step into their territory by forming a gang.
It is a kind of action reaction theory of Newton’s that every action leads to certain reaction to it. Parents play the most important role in their children’s lives. When they treat them with lack of concern, they will end up on the street finding the substitute for the love they never received. Many of them came from broken families as one of the delinquents wrote “so by not having a fatherly figure, I turned to the streets and learned how to pull a trigger” (299). They did not have a role model that directed their path. As I expected, he was not only one that “turned to the streets” because of their father. In fact nearly all of them showed that they lacked a fatherly figure in their childhoods as proven by what Victor, wrote. He complained, “They don’t know what it’s like when you come from a family that didn’t have a father there to guide you in the right path” (290). These children were looking for a place where they can find a substitute for the attention and love that they lacked and thus they went out and got themselves tangled into gangs and concurrently they practice the use of violence.
I believe that what Salzman did, providing a writing class for the juveniles, could help them to speak up and open their mind. When they were locked up, there was no such thing as no turning back. They carried hopes but they could not do it all by themselves. All the kids in the “True Notebooks” admitted that they felt lonely in their cell. “Here I am. In this lonely place that has become my life, I am all alone” said one of the prisoners (67). They have nobody to talk to, they never know what is going to happen in the cell, people come and go very fast in the prison. Many felt remorseful for their delinquent behaviors and wished to rewind back the situation to prevent themselves from doing the crime. They want to change for the better as one of the kids said, “The people just think I am a piece of shit, but they never know I feel remorse. And I try to be a good person without my freedom, I lonely. I need help. Sometimes I wonder how can I get back my happiness without help?” (224). When they feel alone, they could not help it but to think negatively. They need somebody to talk to, to give support and give encouragement. By giving them chances to convey their emotions, they can change for the better. This is proven by one of his student, Kevin Jackson as he wrote, “writing has helped me open up to other people and have an open mind to their opinions. Writing has taught me a lot about myself that I never knew I had bottled up inside” (275). The writing class showed them that somebody cared for them and that they were not alone. It fulfilled their psychological needs and I believe it could change the aspect of lives from their negative thought because they are provided place to confide and open up their mind. By sharing their stories in the class they can learn from each other and do not feel lonely anymore. Besides, it will improve their writing skills which might be useful for them when they are released.
Punishing the juveniles will give them extra depression and kill their future. As written in the article “New Report Finds Growing Trend of Prosecuting Youth in Adult Court Casting Too Wide a Net; Many Youth Charged with Non-Violent Offenses”, sending the youngsters to adult court is “tantamount to throwing away their lives and giving up all hope for their future”. In juvenile’s court, the youngsters are given education and they are provided with facilities for them to open up their mind. Whereas in the adult court, the criminals are incarcerated without any education as Benny Wong, one of the author’s students, said “jail is not a place that makes a person rehabilitate. Jail is just a place that separates people… It doesn’t teach a person anything” (291). Moreover they are confined together with adults that have potentially been charged with more severe crimes than them as their buddy which will make it harder for them to change.
I disagree with the judges that make decision by pertaining to the races as written in the same article that people “found that minority youth receive more severe treatment than white youth”. The judges often carry the discrimination against black people in their judgment that “of all the cases in the study, 82% involved minority youth African-American youth represented over half of the cases”. Black people, as usual, are always treated with contempt. Judges who speak in the name of law cannot make verdict with prejudice. Though they are criminals and minority, they still have their success and future waiting for them.
I found no purpose in giving sanction to the youth criminals by confining them in adult jails, however, I agree that sometimes this doesn’t apply to everybody. It is undeniable that some of them are just resistant to encouragement and refrain themselves from changing their mind. I think it is better to choose prudently those who are better off sent to adult court and those who will value the treatment in the juvenile system so that they want and will change for the better.
The primary socialization has once again played its role in defining these juveniles’ characteristic and behavior. Everything starts from their society and the most influential agents of all are their parents. Once the juveniles step into the wrong path, they screw up their whole life. People must be selfless to these criminals and stop making them suffer for the rest of their lives. Juvenile courts are the place for them to reborn and rotate their lives 180 degree. From the victims’ side, I believe they tend to choose to punish the criminals. But punishing them will not change the done to undone, instead it will annihilate their dreams, futures and lives.

What Makes Identity?

In our lives, identity is developed gradually throughout our lives. Through socialization, an individual is shaped up into a unique person. In different stages of lives we undergo different kinds of socialization. But for all processes our identity is dependent of our societies. Basically our personalities reflect our societies. There are two types of socialization. One is solely based on our societies where we grow up. This is called primary socialization. When an individual is born, he has no identity. The individual slowly learn and grow so he can be independent of himself. “Every individual is born into an objective social structure within which he encounters the significant others who are in charge of his socialization” (Berger 34). Unfortunately during the process of learning and become an unique person, he must first go through process of primary socialization. This process is absolutely relying on other people in his society. “Infants and young children first of all develop as social beings by imitating the actions of those around them” (Giddens 69). Because babies learn by copying the adults, how the adults act will affect the personalities of them. If the societies within which the babies grow up are bad, the babies will not grow into a coherent person but have a big possibility of being tangled up into drugs addicted, criminals and other negative impacts. From my experience in my country, Indonesia, where many people are still uneducated and suffering from poverty, it is very obvious from the rate of crimes that the society mould the people badly. If I compare the villagers with the urban people in Indonesia who are educated, the one who create havoc and appear in crimes channel more often is the villagers. Of all the people in the society, families are playing the most important roles in shaping up the individuals. “In modern societies, social position is not inherited at birth in this way, yet the region and social class of the family into which an individual is born affects patterns of socialization quite distinctly” (Giddens 71). As the children will spend most of their time with their families, they will internalize the general roles of lives from their families. Families will be the one who teach a lot of important things to the individuals and thus the “generalized other”, the general basic roles which will stick in the individuals for the rest of their lives. I realize that the courtesies that different people have are always different and these are first developed from our homes. When a child is rude, his mother, father, brother and other members of his family will scold him. He will then realize that being rude is bad as all the people are disagree with him. Later on in his life he will always remember his mistake and be a polite person. An individual will first see himself through the eyes of other people. “The individual experiences himself as such, not directly, but only indirectly, from the particular standpoints of other individual members of the same social group, or from the generalized standpoint of the social group as a whole to which he belongs.” (Mead 25). How the people in the society treat him, he will treat himself the same way. The self-esteem of a child is developed by the society. According to my experience in my family, my cousin is a very shy person because she used to be mocked around when she was young. After all the primary socialization has been done, the secondary socialization follows. Secondary socialization happens after all the solid personality has formed. But the secondary socialization can change one’s personality and if the society is good secondary socialization will mould the individual into a better person. For example, the working environment often forces an individual to change to be able to adapt to it. “The work environment often poses unfamiliar demands, perhaps calling for major adjustments in the person’s outlook or behavior” (Giddens 73). A demanding leader in the work place often intimidates an individual, he will try not to make mistake and make him a more efficient worker. The same thing happened for me in my new environment, which is USA. I am an international student from Indonesia, as the labor workers are cheap almost all of the families have servants who will take care of the houses, whereas here I have to take care of my house alone. This forced me to learn to do all the cleaning activities which took me some hard times and changed me to become more independent. The secondary socialization will not stop as our societies are always changing with time. What forms our identity is the society. Our identity is formed through the things that happen in our surroundings. Good society will result in good identity and bad surroundings will create a bad individual. So this interdependent reflect the action reaction law. How a person act is the result of the behaviors in his society.

Our Personalities Are Dependent On Our Societies

When we were infants, we were dependent on our societies. Our basic needs were all fulfilled by our families and relatives we grew up with. Besides being dependent on them for our basic needs, there are other things that we were also reliant on or influenced by. One of them is our personalities. Our personalities reflect our societies we grew up in. All the things that had happened in our societies had somehow influenced how we represent ourselves today. They are called our agents of socialization. In “Farmworker’s Daughter” by Rose Castillo Guilbault, she tells us about her personal history which had built her character and personality. After reading the novel, I found many similar experiences of primary socialization that helped me to understand the way families, friends and everybody in our societies can be strong influencing factors which molds us into who we are today.
Rose was raised up in a poor family. She always had to struggle to get what she wanted because of her financial status. She worked very hard when she wanted to go on vacation to Mexico as she said “I wanted to go on vacation like so many of my classmates, but my parents couldn’t afford it” (Guilbault 96). Unlike many other kids, she had to rely on herself to get what she wanted. Her father also helped her in getting her ‘’independent character’’. Once, when Rose’s mother helped her to ask for a doll from her father, he replied, “you’ll spoil her by giving in to anything she wants” ( Guilbault 14). Her father was very strict to her. He did not want her to be a spoilt child and thus never give what she wanted easily. Rose had to work hard for everything she wanted but after she has attained it, she will appreciate and cherish what she has. Her strong character was built by these past experiences in her society.
Her case was pretty similar to mine except that I grow up in a family with moderate economic status but my parents never let me get anything I want easily because they want me to work for it instead. By doing this way they train me to be prudent in managing my finance as I believe that I have to work for anything I want.
Rose mother’s decision with regards to her divorce was a very brave one in the Mexican society as it was considered a taboo and unacceptable. She writes “my generation would create no-vault divorce, but in my mother’s time and place a woman was expected to endure whatever her marriage brought” (Guilbault 18). The choice she made was defiant but bold enough to contradict her family tradition and moved to USA without any proficiency to keep her survived. I believe Rose was affected by this choice a lot, not only the endurance but also her personality. Seeing her mother broke the family rule and took the next step of immigrating to USA, she was trained to stand on her own decision and be strong to take it.
Although Rose mother did not follow the tradition of keeping the marriage but she was still conservative. She did not allow Rose to be influenced by the western culture and stood to her tradition when she said “Nice girls don’t go around walking with strange boys. You don’t know their families” (Guilbault 153). Rose’s mother scolded her when she discovered that Rose wanted to exchange phone with strangers. She did not want Rose to go out with outsiders and keep the woman’s pride. The effect was obvious when Rose went out with her girlfriends and felt uncomfortable when they started to hang around with soldiers who were strangers. She was not influenced by her friends and tried to keep her pride when she said “I sit with my back turned to the traffic, praying no one sees me hanging out with doggies” (Guilbault 154). At that time going out with soldiers whom she called doggies was considered contemptible. She kept her mother‘s advice in her mind as she went home.
My family is quite conservative like Rose’s family who opposed divorce among couple. My parents are greatly influenced by their Chinese ancestors and thus they are not accepting some of the western cultures like blind date. They have strong hypothesis that women are prohibited to have sex before marriage in order to keep their pride. Indecent relationships will be the attraction catcher in my family. They will be the topic of denigration and in a twinkling of an eye the rumor is spread to all the members. My family disapproves gay marriage as well. I grow up in a modern era where technology becomes part of me. Although when I was young the exposure of modern life in my country was not very obvious but through media young kids were globalized and became more open-minded. I do adhere to the believes that my parents have but my acceptance of the unpleasant things that are happening out there is bigger than theirs. My growing society doesn’t really make me grasp to the traditional Chinese norm but I still hold to some of them and apply it to my daily activities. The society in which I grow makes me partially conservative.
She was raised in a poor family but exposed to the luxury at the same time. Many rich people were having prejudice to her. There was one event when she said “My mother suspected aunt Tere did not want her friends from la sociedad to know we were farmworkers” (Guilbault 105) proved that she was discriminated. I believe this force her to be acceptance to her fate. She never complained about her financial status. Seeing her friends got to eat expensive food which she couldn’t have, she accepted it and didn’t whine for it like what most kids do. She just went home and didn’t complain to her mother at all. The society had shaped her up into an accepting girl.
I experienced the situations in which I cannot do anything but to accept my life. Like when I was young, my parents never brought me for vacation when most of my friends were boastful about their trips. I tried very hard to coax them to have a family vacation but I never succeed. In the end I could not do anything and accept the fact that they do not like moving around. This helps me in my later life when I realized there are many things I just cannot have even after I worked hard for it. I believe that makes me never envy my friends for having things I do not have and be grateful in any situation.
Environments, besides family, also have influences for us. For teenagers, famous people often give inspiration and move us on towards our goals. Rose was influenced by Beatles, a band that was popular at that era. Not only her that was influenced by this band but other teenagers as well. Her friend was too carried away by the Beatles that “She and BJ and some other friends had formed a musical group called the Screamies. It was their strategy for meeting the Beatles” (Guilbault 128). Rose, knowing that her friends formed a band to meet Beatles, had a wit to meet the Beatles also that is to join the “Screamies”. I believe her personality is changed by the Beatles by making her work to reach her goal with more socialization with other people which also gave her more friends. I believe Beatles made her realized that there were limitations to many things after “Screamies” was dispersed when she said “I was drawn to their ambitious vision that challenged the limited possibilities of our rural existence” (Guilbault 131). She gave up on her dream about meeting Beatles thereafter.
I am greatly influenced by a pianist named Richard Clayderman. I listen to his songs a lot and he always becomes the topic in my conversations with my friend who has the same interest with me. He is my role model in finding my interest which is playing music instrument. I began to practice piano harder after I was influenced by him and later on I found that music is a big part of my life. After I knew how to play piano I listen to music everyday. I never skip a day without music. I believe I have built my personality through him. Music makes my day brighter and leads me to a dream of becoming a composer although I am not majoring in music. As there is never an end for music, I always have a topic to talk to my friends, music. This makes me have a lot more friends. The popular trend for music is changing with time and I believe my passion in music is the reason why I always follow the changes. Not only the trends in music I have followed but I update the trends in many other things that the popular culture experience.
In our lives we always have someone who becomes a role model for us that gives us inspiration that keep us going. In her case her teacher, Mrs. Rojas, was the role model. She was a Mexican immigrant who never let any problems became obstacles that refrained her in pursuing her dream to become a teacher. Rose was facing the same problem of discrimination, poverty and loneliness as an immigrant. By knowing that it’s not only her that experienced the hardships I believe will make Rose stronger. Rose was influenced by Mrs. Rojas who never gave up her dream which made Rose continue pursuing her dream. I believe Mrs. Rojas affected Rose’s life and made her never give up.
I also have a role model which is my friend. She has a very chaotic family condition. Since young she was exposed to the affair that her father has and she has to bear her mother’s burden as her mother always confides to her every single miserable condition. What move my heart is the fact that she never give up. She never surrenders her life but keep move on. I am influenced by how hard she works to achieve her dream and never give herself a limitation. Although I know she has to bear her family problem but a smiley face is always drawn on her face and achievements at her studies are still a part of her life. By seeing her achievements, I become more diligent in my studies. When I am about to give up, remembering her life story gives me a power to move on.
By comparing Rose society to how she behaves, there is an interrelated connection. The same thing happens to my personality. There is a link between my current me to the environment in which I grew up. My relatives and friends have always been there to help become a better person. Whatever my parents do to me will shape me up into myself. Every single problem that I face trains me to become a tougher and definitely better person. This happened to Rose as well. Problems, discriminations and dilemma that Rose experienced make her stronger and tougher. Every event that had happened in our lives affects not only ourselves but also the way we interact to many different situations and thus our societies mold our personalities.