Violence: Exam 2 Flashcards
Why do people appear to get involved in violent conflicts and even kill themselves over matters that seem trivial (e.g., an insult, not giving someone the right of way in a street, etc.)?
“Senseless Violence”
Gould’s argues that violent conflict occurs because?
People are interested in achieving dominance or superiority in a relationship.
The actual substantive issues over which individuals compete (such as money or physical things) may not matter much. What matters is?
Achieving dominance, which is often symbolic in nature.
Having the right of way on a narrow avenue is an important symbol of deference; it signals that the other person is of higher rank or status. This is an example of?
Achieving Dominance
we are constantly competing for dominance in relationships.
Gould’s Framework
We are either trying to attain dominance and assert our higher rank over others or…
have our status respected and reinforced.
Conflict and violence is more likely to arise in what type of relationships?
relationships where individuals are unclear about their rank.
When is it more likely to be challenged and lead to conflict and possibly violence?
Attempting to establish superiority
In hierarchical relationships such as that between a boss and a subordinate
The higher status of the former is clearly defined.
Most violent conflict occurs between?
People with prior relation not between strangers.
4 out of 5 victims of homicide in the U.S. are?
Socially tied to their attackers.
If greater exposure explained why homicide victims and offenders are socially related then family members would?
Kill each other more frequently than acquaintances, and this is not the case.
Brothers are more likely to kill brothers, and sisters are more likely to kill sisters.
Homicides would be evenly distributed within nuclear families, but they are not.
When a son kills a parent he is more likely to kill his?
Father
A daughter is more likely to kill?
A Mother
Spouses are more likely to kill?
Each other than anyone else in the family.
What are the types of relations where rank is more contested
Sons, Daughters, and Spouses
Gould’s argues that “violence happens when people get caught in…………. and when for various reasons the contest is ………. using external social cues concerning the proper outcome.
Contests for social rank……..Difficult to resolve
If Gould’s notion is right then some kinds of relations are more…………………………. than others, regardless of the kinds of people in those relations.
vulnerable to serious conflict
The more ambiguous the relation …………………. the more likely violence is.
Who should be expected to outrank
One sign that the conflict is about rank is?
There is a sensitivity to process and not just the substance and outcome of a dispute.
What is important in establishing rank?
Gestures
Tone
Demeanor
Go, To, Doctor
Example of conflict over rank on
pages 74-75.
Even when material things are involved (e.g., money), the conflict over these material things?
Really hides the true origin of a conflict over rank.
Example on page 78 and pages 82-83
Hypothesis: “Killings due to symbolic matters should be more typical of…………………. relations, whereas killings due to substantive matters should be more typical of …………relations”
symmetric relations……………..asymmetric relations
Asymmetric relationships are?
Many people do not feel like equals in their relationships. Feeling of inadequacy
Symmetric relationships are?
A vague sense of harmonious and beautiful proportion and BALANCE.
A second related hypothesis Gould tests has to do with retaliatory violence, that is?
when an assailant “was seeking revenge for a prior offense against himself or herself.” (p. 96)
Retaliatory violence is a response to?
Perceived humiliation.
Since such violence does not accomplish anything more than annihilating a rival, it cannot be plausibly interpreted as a result of conflict over substantial matters, but rather over?
symbolic dominance.
Retaliatory violence should also be more common in…………..relations?
symmetric relations than asymmetric ones. See Table 7.
Gould argues that those individuals whose sense of self is more embedded in the…………than devoted to the……………. are more prone to violence when deference claims are challenged.”
past ……… future
A future-oriented person is more likely to let affronts to his status go unchallenged because?
He weighs the consequences for his future self more heavily.
A person who is more oriented towards the past will less likely let affronts to his honor and status go unchallenged, because?
Past actions will weigh on his mind more heavily and is therefore more likely to seek redress.
Honor societies
Value impulsive acts and vengeance,
Urbanized modern societies
Commonly accept and encourage prudence and forgiveness
Models of how individuals are supposed to cohere over time.
Honor societies and Urbanized modern societies.
Revenge-seeking and impulsive, violent responses to insult require that individuals look backward, notably to past wrongs, and that they substantially disregard their personal well-being in the future is what type of society?
Honors Societies
prudence and peacemaking demand, in contrast, that wronged persons abandon the past and embrace the future is what type of society?
Urbanized modern societies
Black suggests that much of what we consider as crime in contemporary societies may be interpreted as a form of?
“Self-help”
Crime as a form of “self-help” is committed as a response to?
something that an individual perceives to be unjust.
“self-help” crime occurs when?
Individuals do not have access to legal institutions.
The Different interpretive framework?
The injustices that individuals are responding to may not be recognized as such by contemporary law or may not appear justified from others’ point of view.
Black’s formulation implies that….
crime is moralistic in nature.
Black’s states, one kind of social control is known as self-help. Defined as….
the expression of a grievance by unilateral aggression such as personal violence or property destruction.”
Black’s interpretation about social control in self-help makes no assumptions concerning?
The impact of social control upon conformity, social order or anything else…”
Hirschi asks: Why do individuals conform to…?
social norms?
Hirschi states, individuals conform because they are…..?
Bonded to society
In Hirschi’s definition of social control. Deliquent acts result when?
Individuals’ bonds to society are broken
Problems with Black’s interpretation?
“much of the conduct described by anthropologists as conflict management, social control, or even law in tribal and other traditional societies is regarded as crime in modern societies.”
Is June Nash finds.
“any individual killed from ambush is automatically labeled ‘the one who had guilt’. “‘Homicide is considered a reaction to crime, not a crime in itself.’
In Nash’s finding: In many societies a “self-respecting man” must kill a man when?
he discovers him with his wife.
“Societies such as these” (described by Nash), says Black, “have, in effect, capital punishment administered on a….?
private basis.”
Collective Liability
Unlike penalties imposed by law, killings may elicit a reciprocal exchange of violence or feuds.
What makes revenge killings turn into feuds is that there is a sense of…?
Collective Liability
Any member of the group the assassin belongs to is a legitimate target for reprisal.
I subject to revenge killing
Violence against women in many contexts is seen as a form of social control. Punishment for wives’ disobedience, lack of respect. This is an example of?
Collective Liability
Property destruction is also a form of social control: someone thought to have committed some wrong against another may find his house burned down, his crops destroyed. This is an example of?
Collective Liability
Dueling is another example of violence used as a form of?
Self-help
Theft or confiscation of property and rape of female relatives is used as?
Forms of social control or Collective Liability
Black argues that, as in traditional societies “most intentional homicide in modern life is?
A response to conduct that the killer regards as deviant.”
Black states: half of all homicides in Houston in a given year occurred as a result of?
quarrel
self-defense
provoked
Many homicides are a result of? adultery or actions considered affronts to a man’s honor.
adultery or actions considered affronts to a man’s honor.
The victim of an offense perpetuated as a form of social control may not even be aware that the crime was committed as a form of social control. Black calls this?
“secret social control.”
One problem with Black’s board formulation is that…?
all homicides may in one form or another be explained as social control or self-help if one just searches for the right interpretation.
Black’s argument becomes……. because the concept of social control loses any analytical or predictive utility.
Tautological
Black so-called deterrent effect?
the degree that people feel morally obligated to commit a crime, the capacity of the criminal law to discourage them must be weakened.” (p. 39)
“A theory of deterrence surely should recognize that the ……………….to deter crime partly depends upon whether a given crime is itself a form of…………………….”
power of punishment………Social control
Violence resulting from self-help may frequently deter future offenses against a person so that banning crimes of self-help by the state may do what?
paradoxically lead to an increase in some types of crimes.
Why does so much crime of self-help occur in U.S. society?
Because there are many contexts in which the law is less available.
Violence used to enforce illegal contracts. Is an example of what?
Where law is less available
The law is sometimes also………… to individuals of………….. who seek redress for wrongs committed by people of……………..
unavailable………lower status………….higher status
Study of Warriors & Peacemakers:
What role do third parties play in conflict between “principals”?
Mark Cooney
Third parties can shape conflict by?
Promoting
Encouraging
Aiding participants
Acting as Peacekeepers
The role of third parties in promoting or reducing violence depends on two things, what?
- Status of third parties relative to principals
2. Closeness of third parties relative to principals
Third parties are?
those who have knowledge of a conflict, actual or potential.
People have potential knowledge when?
They do not know about a particular conflict, they often learn, by virtue of their status or position, or similar conflicts.
Family members, friends, neighbors, coworkers, bystanders, police officers, and judges are all examples of?
Third parties
Violence is not the result of a?
Lack of morality
Most violence is moralistic in nature, it results from?
Disputes over right and wrong.
It is the violation of standards of acceptable behavior that is?
Punished with violence.
Violence is only one way in which?
People manage conflict
Donald Black: Social Control = ?
“how people define and respond to deviant behavior”
Five ways to manage conflict:
- Self-help (aggression)
- Avoidance
- Negotiation
- Settlement (third party intervention)
- Toleration (inaction)
Cooney’s argument about the role of third parties can help account for many other studies that?
look at patterns of homicide often find that lower status groups have higher rates of homicide;
Studies that look at homicide rates often find a significant association with inequality; this can also be explained by the status of?
Third Parties
Who evidence comes from a set of interviews conducted of homicide offenders in prison, and a review of anthropological work on homicide across 30 pre-industrial societies.
Cooney’s
Status:
Third parties who are of higher social status than principals tend to be…?
Repressive and unpopular
Higher status third parties will be more?
decisive, formalistic, coercive, and punitive when dealing with principals
There is more violence among individuals of lower status in modern societies because…?
Higher status third parties are more decisive, formalistic, coercive, and punitive when dealing with principals.
Five kinds of statuses:
- Vertical
- Radial
- Cultural
- Normative
- Organizational
Vagina, Reading, Can, Not, Orgasm.
Example of Vertical Status?
Wealth
Radial Status?
Integration. Example: unemployment, marriage, age)
Cultural Status
Level of education and participation in the culture of the majority
Normative Status
Respectability. Example: previous arrests
Example of Organizational Status?
Organizational Affiliation
Third parties of lower status will not prevent violence because…?
They lack respect and authority.
Relationship between third-party status and violence is a….?
U Shape
Closeness-Distance:
Under what conditions will third parties remain neutral, aid or help avoid violence?
Depends on their social distance
Three dimensions of social distance?
- Relational Distance
- Cultural Distance
- Organizational Distance
A U shape line graph in relationship between Violence and Third Party Status means…?
Violence peaks as:
the relational closeness of third-party ties to one side and their distance from other.
AND with the organizational closeness and distance of third parties.
Relational Distance
Intimacy
Organizational Distance
Extent to which individuals belong to same group
Cultural Distance
How different the cultures between individuals
Collin’s Micro and Macro Causes of Violence rejects…?
theories of violence based on individual motives.
Collin proposes an inter-actional theory were we should begin by examining…….?
the nature of interactions in violence-threatening situations
“The dominant emotion in violent confrontations is?
Tension
Violent confrontations rising to the level of paralyzing fear, and almost always making the performance of violent acts…?
Inaccurate and incompetent
Confrontational tension/fear (ct/f) is common to all forms of violence. What varies are?
the “pathways” by which this tension/fear is overcome
Without overcoming confrontation tension/fear………….would not occur.
Violence
5 pathways by which confrontation tension/fear (ct/f) is overcome:
- Attacking the Weak
- Audience-oriented, staged and controlled fair fights
- Confrontation-avoiding remote violence
- Confrontation-avoiding by deception
- Confrontation-avoiding by absorption in technique
Most common form of violence?
Attacking the weak
In this situation violence is one-sided, “not so much a fight as a beating”.
Attacking the weak.
An individual or group attacks a much weaker adversary.
The most successful form of gang activity is when a rival individual is caught by a larger group out of his turf and therefore unprotected.
This is an example of what type of ct/f?
Attacking the Weak
Professional criminals learn techniques of attacking weak victims; the key is….?
not so much physical dominance as finding those who are situationally weak.
Bullying is another systematic form of…?
attacking the weak.
Bullies do not attack the popular and socially-connected, but those that are isolated.
- prolonged confrontation
- Then, one side suddenly shows itself to be weak (falling down, becoming emotionally dominated). * The other side then rushes upon the now-weak victim piling on in a rush of violence.
This form of attacking the weak is an example of….?
Forward Panic
Example of forward panic is…?
military massacres and police brutality
Stopped at Collins
Slide 8
