The defensive turn

One of the things I try to do in my sociology courses is disrupt students’ normal way of looking at the world to show them that things are often not as simple as they seem. From this perspective, one of the most interesting things about the Zimmerman trial to me was his claim that he was defending himself after he actively pursued Trayvon Martin. As President Obama noted in his recent speech on the case, the idea of Stand Your Ground laws are complicated by the difficulty of telling who is on the offensive and who is on the defensive. Obama stated:

For those who resist that idea that we should think about something like these ‘‘stand your ground’’ laws, I just ask people to consider if Trayvon Martin was of age and armed, could he have stood his ground on that sidewalk? And do we actually think that he would have been justified in shooting Mr. Zimmerman, who had followed him in a car, because he felt threatened? And if the answer to that question is at least ambiguous, it seems to me that we might want to examine those kinds of laws.

While my fighting experience is limited to being punched twice in the face (on separate occasions), it seems that in most fights both parties are on both offense and defense. In this case, the fight between Martin and Zimmerman could have easily started because Martin felt threatened by the man who followed him first in his truck and then on foot. In the event that somebody is pursuing you, defending yourself seems like a reasonable course of action. As soon as the fight started, though, Martin’s defense would be perceived by Zimmerman as offense and Zimmerman may have felt that he was defending himself. The cliche that the best defense is a good offense is based on the complicated interplay in situations like this.

The idea that fights like this are either/or affairs where one person is attacking and the other may be “standing his ground” could use a good dose of disruption. Situations like these are the perfect time to commit sociology for the greater good.

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The ASA is back!

Speaking of stupid ideas, the full functionality of the ASA’s website was restored yesterday after its database upgrade. To their credit, this only took one more day than they estimated. Of course, the fact that this work only took one extra day does not excuse the fact that it was poorly scheduled. I guess that we can all resume committing sociology now!

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Sociology on the rise?

In the past few weeks, there have been two relatively high-profile attacks on sociology (recognizing, of course, that anything reaching beyond the walls of sociology departments is relatively high-profile). In the first, N+1 published an article claiming that there is “too much sociology” because everybody already sees the world sociologically. In the second, Justin Trudeau’s argued that it is necessary to examine the root causes of problems like terrorism, prompting Stephen Harper, Canada’s Prime Minister, to state, “This is not a time to commit sociology, if I can use an expression [that I just made up].”

Beyond potentially causing the ASA to shut down its website, I see these attacks as a positive sign for sociology. In my experience, lots of sociologists wish that policymakers would pay more attention to our ideas while lots of people in the general public have no idea what sociology is. (Admit it, half of your family members have jokingly requested that you don’t psychoanalyze them.) The fact that some, even some in positions of power, are criticizing sociological ideas means that they are at least vaguely familiar with sociological ideas. That seems like progress to me.

*The buttons in the picture above are available for sale at this website. According to their creator, all proceeds will be donated to the Canadian Sociological Association’s student research award. I have already ordered one, adding to my growing collection of sociological buttons.

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Of course they will

When I received notice that my paper had been accepted for this year’s ASA conference in New York, it included the following statement, “As a Program Participant you must pre-register by May 15, 2013 to avoid your paper being removed from the program.” Today, the ASA sent an e-mail to members informing them that “Online access to the member portal, meeting registration, the ASA online bookstore, the TRAILS online database of teaching resources, and the ASA Job Bank will be unavailable from May 6 until approximately May 15” (bold and italics in original!). Visiting the ASA website reveals the same information via the notice above.

Thankfully, the ASA extended the preregistration deadline to May 30 although, since this is the ASA we’re dealing with, the odds that the website will not be functional on May 15 and the preregistration deadline will be further extended are good. Whether the website is back on the 15th or not, is there another professional organization that would schedule to shut down online access to meeting registration during its prime meeting registration time? I would guess that there is not.

For conspiracy theorists, there is also the fact that the ASA announced plans to shut down its website just days after the Canadian Prime Minister warned us all that “this is not a time to commit sociology.” Hmm… I guess that if the database upgrade fails the ASA can always blame Canada!

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