SOCI370/Durkheim

Unsatisfied Personal Needs with Residential Rules- Miaoting Ma

Durkheim argues that an individual's need should be in consistent with what one can obtain; otherwise, the person might feel discomfortable. Furthermore, everyone's need is bounded by the society, as a form of authority. This theory can be related to the pheonomenon that residents who live in UBC housing should obey the housing contract, including not causing loud noise or having overnight guests who stay too long. In reality, residents come from distinct academic, cultural backgrounds and often have different personalities, leading to various levels of frictions or conflicts. Nevertheless, every tenant have the same rules to obey and will be treated equally by UBC housing and the resident advisor no matter how someone wants to satisfy his or herself. Ultimately, those who do not want to do the proper cleaning or make substantial noises feel unfit to the residential culture, and based on Durkheim, their distress may be because they have broken the equilibrium state of need and satisfaction.

Suicide in S. Korea and Anomic Suicide -- Gisung Ha

For the past few decades, we have observed a dramatic increase of South Korean teens committing suicide. Much of this recent suicidal trend is due to the increased amount of pressure in which society puts on students from a young age to perform well in school. If you have the resources available, students are put into extra curricular schooling in order to attain an advantage over their fellow students. Education is of the upmost importance in South Korea because of the direct correlation between the results of their single test score to their post-secondary institution as well as their future employment. Although we are able to see a visible correlation between the societal pressures to the increase in suicides, I believe Durkheim’s concept of anomic suicide further describes the underlying force to this trend. According to Durkheim, when there are not enough resources to fulfill our needs, we become unhappy, therefore, our desires need to be confined in order for us to be happy. This, however, is difficult for human beings because unlike any other sentient beings, our imagination allows us to desire for more. Durkheim states that in order to be happy, we need a system of morals that will act as a limiting force. Due to the current ideational shift in South Korea towards individualistic goals and the importance of one’s future well being, their current societal system does not allow them to put limits on their desires. As a result, when a certain desire is not achieved, good test scores in this case, this acts as a strong force to suicide.

Comments by Rita Qiao Li: The students suicide issue in Korea has attracted many people's attention. And I think this is a good example of explaining Durkheim's concept of anomic suicide. When people want more, but there are not enough or efficient means of satisfying those wants, here problems might come. The students want to look good in their classmates and parents' eyes, but it is so hard to do so, and this has caused their suicides. This is where common morality and collective consciousness need to step in. People need these to help control their desire and regulate their thoughts. However, most societies in different countries have been encouraging the improvement of economic as well as self-efficiency, like you said, it is not a easy task to make the morality and consciousness work widely.

Unrealistic Expectations in Millennials and Gen Z -- Alex Wang

Durkheim’s points out that while animals and humans both have needs, animals’ needs are physical and have limits; equilibrium can be reached between needs and satisfaction. (i.e. If a tiger gets hungry, it could eat some meat and it will be content. The tigers’ needs will arise and can be satisfied, since it could not eat an unlimited amount of meat.) Humans also have physical needs, but since they have consciousness they also have other desires that are unlimited. (i.e. If a human was given the chance to have unlimited whishes, he would probably keep on wishing to satisfy his unlimited wants) If these wants are not regulated, Durkheim argues that humans would never be happy, since they will wish for the unachievable and believe they could attain it in the future. This unrealistic expectation will cause them to work hard, but as they can never achieve their unrealistic goals they will become depressed, loose sight of the meaning in life and may even be driven to egotistic suicide. Durkheim argues that it is better to for society to control the expectations of each social class, in a way that all people will agree to it’s fairness, so that each person would have a realistic framework to judge their lives and allow them to appreciate what they have, providing a more meaningful existence. Durkheim pointed out that throughout history, the expectations of social classes have been managed both by religion and governments, he argues that the government should use it’s respected authority to control people’s expectations realistically, not use it to promote materialism that only feeds fantasies. Durkheim’s views become interesting when applied to today’s younger generations. Generation Y and Generation Z are taught at youth by their parents that they would live good lives and will be able to achieve anything. As such many of our fellow Millennials form unrealistic expectations and get depressed when things don’t work out. (Maybe this is the cause for Gen Y’s bad rep) These ideals is also the reason why Generation Z is being pushed so hard, why they are taking on so many extracurricular activities and responsibilities, all in the name of getting into a good college and being able to live their ideal life. For Durkheim, the Millennials provide proof that unrealistic expectations leading to unhappiness. Durkheim would advise Generation Z to make more grounded goals, as they would never achieve their unrealistic expectations and by currently working so hard, they are just making themselves miserable for an unachievable goal that would only provide disappointment, depression and hollowness.

Poverty & Religion As Inhibitors of Suicide -- Adriano Clemente

According to Durkheim, economic progress (in particular, industrialization/capitalism) is one of the main causes of increase in suicide. Individuals in society become wealthier, but at the same time, more miserable as well. It is important to note that with economic progress comes liberation, meaning individuals are granted more opportunities to do things for themselves. From economic progress we see the two inhibitors, poverty and religion, become less relevant as inhibitors of suicide. Firstly, Durkheim states "poverty protects against suicide because it is a restraint in itself. No matter how one acts, desires have to depend upon resources to some extent; actual possessions are partly the criterion of those aspired to. So the less one has the less he is tempted to extent the range of his needs indefinitely" (pg. 69). Therefore, prior to economic progression and industrialization, it allowed for poverty to flourish more. Not that poverty is a good thing, but I argue it created more opportunity for 'likeness' in the sense of less people pursuing unattainable goals leading to states of unhappiness. As the material world began to grow the desire for material goods did as well as "the more one has, the more one wants, since satisfactions received only stimulate instead of filling needs" (pg. 66). Secondly, "the influence of religion was felt alike by workers and masters, the poor and the rich. It consoled the former and taught them contentment with their lot by informing them of the providential nature of the social order" (pg. 69). Thus, we can see that Religion (likewise to poverty) created another feeling of likeness and sameness that acted as an inhibitor of suicide. Religion made it 'okay' to not have material riches. With the economy flourishing, it created excessive hope meaning there could be limitless luxury. I believe this holds relevance, as "it has been claimed, the human activity naturally aspires beyond assignable limits and sets itself unattainable goals" (pg. 66). This means there was room for new levels of disappointment in oneself as religion lost power, and more people found their ways out of poverty. With the increase in suicide being attributed to economic progress and industrialization, one could argue the shift of solidarity in society from 'mechanical solidarity' to 'organic solidarity'.

Capitalism & Anomie and their Relation to Suicide-- Sessen Stephanos

Durkheim states that the desire of needs by humans extends beyond simply physical means of survival. These needs vary by individual but they are infinite and occur across different classes. Durkheim argues that it is part of human nature to constantly search for these goals and desires, this process leads the individual to suffer and the only way this can be avoided is by an external force (society) that regulates these desires. Religious and federal institutions provide limitations and restraints for our desires on the basis of morality. A proper example of anomie is looking at poor populations in a country like the United States or Canada vs the poorest communities in a country like Ethiopia. It is clear that the people in the former group live a life with a higher standard of living. However, through this capitalist system, society provides little moral guidance to restrain our desires. As a matter of fact is seen as moral to have infinate desires- this attitude is most prevalent in the economic world. As a result, poor communities in countries like the United States are constantly surrounded by unattainable desires and reminders of what could be possible but is not their reality. This unfettered life that is defined by the acquisition of these needs leads to extreme pain and suffering. Which is why you see more poor people commit suicide in countries like the United States than the poor people in a country like Ethiopia. Furthermore, this could also go to explain why there is such a cultural difference in approach and discussion about suicide.

Minimum Wage Factory Workers and Fatalistic Suicide - Nofar Lapidot

Humans have intangible needs, beyond the physical needs that can be satisfied through our internal feedback systems within our body; hunger, thirst, etc. Durkheim suggests that these human non-physical needs require a feedback system as regulation, which is done through the external forces in our societies. In the case of factory workers in less economically developed nations, these regulations are used to oppress the workers into performing menial, below-minimum wage jobs. The infamous story of Foxconn, the Apple manufacturing factory in China where workers resorted to committing suicide by jumping out of the factory's windows, is a real life example of Durkheim's concept of fatalistic suicides. Fatalistic describes one of the four reasons for suicide that Durkheim gives, where the oppressive society imposes too much regulation. The workers not only experience oppressive regulations but are also the ones who produce the sought after goods that are then sold to more economically developed nations as a solution to satisfy the non-physical needs through consumerism