Sociology: Instituations and Socialization

Institutions do agree with what my life experience has taught me are the core values of United State's society, to a certain extent. Social institutions that are directly connected to the outside world of society almost always agree and comport to the core values of society, while ones that aren't do not. In the United States, their core values are freedom, equality, religion, self-esteem, and numerous others. Social institutions such as military and prisons, which are both disconnected from society, do not have the same core values as the rest of society, while social institutions such as education, medicine, and others are directly connected to these core values.

Children, for some time now, have had moral and core values drilled into their selves in schools and these values are directly related to the ones of society. The values that have been taught to children in the educational setting are cultural diversity, self esteem, self expression, fairness, courage, and honesty (McIntyre, 2009, 163-164). Because people in school are still young and their minds can still be shaped, it is still very easy for teachers to instill their knowledge of the outside world. This ties into the fundamental values of society because what is taught in schooling systems is what shapes young individuals into the people they become in the future.

In the military, values are a little bit different than in the United States' society. The values of this social institution are killing, discipline, and confidence (McIntyre, 2009, 205, 207, 211). These values are valid to its own institution; killing and death are the predominant goals of the military institution, the trainers force the soldiers to gain a sense of discipline which can be used both inside and outside of the military life, the soldiers of the military need the confidence to fight successfully in the military. These values do not relate to the ones of the United States society. The military's values are good values morally, but they do not necessarily fit into the common core values of the rest of the society. This can be attributed to the fact that the military, as a whole, is completely cut off from the rest of the world. While the rest of society goes along with the rest of their lives, soldiers are stuck in a foreign country where they have a very limited connection to the rest of society. Although the military has good moral values for the most part, they are not necessarily connected to the core values of the rest of the society.

Prisons do not have regular core values either. This can be explained because prisons are not at all connected to the rest of the society also. Much like the military, prisons have a different set of core values too. Fitting in and superiority are the only real values of prisoners, aside from the obvious value of getting out of the prison (McIntyre, 2009, 222). While people are in prisons, prisoners need to conform to what the stereotypical prisoner is and are forced to have different values. Prisoners will get into fights for no other reason than just to show a sense of superiority over the other prisoners. A lot like the military, prisons do not have the same core values of the rest of society. The predominant reason that prisons have different values than the rest of society is that they are completely disconnected from the rest of the society, as they are in a confined area that also has no contact to the outside world.

In the medical world, doctors and physicians do have the same sense of core values as the rest of society. This can be attributed to the fact that they are directly connected to the rest of society because they deal with many patients daily. All physicians value respect and equality which are almost synonymous with what the American core values are (McIntyre, 2009, 241). Doctors must value respect and equality because if they didn't, there would be many lawsuits and malpractice going on. If the doctors didn't respect their clients, there could be many sexual harassment cases, people would be very uncomfortable with going to the doctor, and people might stop going to the doctor as much and it would seriously hurt the business (McIntyre, 2009, 241). In the medical profession, core values are the very same as the rest of the society. Because of the fact that they are connected to the entire society, they comport to the common core values.

Whether a social institution's core values are like the United States' depends on whether it is directly connected to the rest of society. Institutions like education and medicine have the same values because of this, while other institutions like the military and the justice system do not because they are not at all connected with the rest of society.

Works Cited

McIntyre, Lisa. The Practical Skeptic: Readings in Sociology. 4th. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2008. Print.