¶ … emotionally charged concepts in the study of sociology is that of what constitutes "deviance." In common conversation, to call someone is a "deviant" is usually meant as an insult to that individual's character. It suggests that he or she lives beyond the pale of the law, or engages in aberrant sexual or social behavior. However, in James Henslin's Sociology: A Down-to-Earth Approach, it becomes clear that our notions of deviance are tied to our culture, and what constitutes deviant behavior as a category is not a pre-existing 'fact.' For example, some Indian tribes accept hallucinogenic drug use as natural, rather than as illegal, unlike our own society (Henslin 2005: 139). The "relativity" of deviance in sociological terms means merely departing from a particular socially constructed norm. The sociological notion of relative deviance implies the relative nature of what constitutes a crime (for example, homosexual acts were deemed criminal not so long ago, because societal prejudices were codified into the law), or the relative nature of what is a social faux pas. A fast food cashier refusing to 'seat' a customer with crying children would be shocking, while this behavior might be acceptable in a fancy French restaurant...
For example, what about 'social phobia'? In some societies, shyness is not seen as abnormal, but in the U.S.'s competitive and confrontational culture, it is. But on the other hand, one cannot be so relativistic and state that deviance is just in the eye of the beholder. Jeff Bell, as he discusses in his article in the New York Times on February 6, 2008, entitled "When Anxiety is at the Table," has Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder to such a degree that dining out in a restaurant can feel traumatic. People with OCD are a category of 'deviants' but…
