The Anomaly of the American Dream (Sumblog5)

Harriet Martineau discusses her ideas of morals,  manners,  and anomaly.  To her,  morals are beliefs about behaviors which are dictated by authority and delineated to behaviors which are acceptable (prescribed) and which are to be avoided (proscribed) for all of society. Manners,  on the other hand, I thought she meant were more like behavioral casual events because she talked about associations. It made me think that behaviors are influenced by several environmental factors.  Overall, Martineau's morals seem to stand for the ideal values of society,  while manners are how a society actually behaves. Anomaly is a state which exists when a society experiences a large amount of conflict between ideal values and actual behaviors;  between what it ideally wants to represent and what it actually stands for in reality.

This concept of anomaly can be applied to the american dream and capitalist values. The american dream is supposed to hold values of an equal, free society where so long as you’re hardworking you have the opportunity to pursue your personal ambitions. Reality though does not necessarily reflect this ideology, and not everyone has the same access to opportunities which will raise their living conditions. Anomaly can be seen in capitalist values as well. Under capitalism, competition is a good thing and is supposed to create opportunity and more choice for everyone. In reality, companies merge and consolidate, gaining more and more control over the market and garnering power unequal to that of others. Choice, in the end, is rather limited even though it is not portrayed as such.

I chose the image below to represent the conflict between what an American, capitalist system ideally wants to represent, and what it actually looks like in the real world. The blue half shows the ideal, with everyone having opportunity to raise themselves up in society relatively equally. The red half shows the actual, with a few people at the top and a majority of people being squashed at the bottom, while holding everything up.