Crash Case
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Sociology is a lens in which sociologists look in to view the world. Each society has its own methods of how it properly ties together and operates. Within each society both similar and opposing perspectives exist pertaining to everyday situations. Individual societies have particular cultures that play a huge role in helping form the individual themselves. Sociologists have worked to try to understand these views and how they affect the way people interact with and perceive one another. From many experiments and observations, they have grasped the idea that different societies exist based on the people within it and how they differ. Sociology also branches from the concept of how people influence other factors in society which in turn ends up affecting the people. This has to do with the relationship between public issues and private matters, and how society allows things to happen. In the movie Crash, we see as viewers that there are a lot of different influences that society has placed on people, and how that has affected their behaviors.
Throughout the film Crash, characters are faced with different social issues that influence their behavior. One of the biggest issues would be stereotypes and racism. In one of the first scenes, we see Rick and Jean Cabot walking down the street. They appear to be wealthy by their demeanor and appearance. Two young black men also are walking down the same street, going in the opposite direction the Cabots were heading. Seeing the two men, Jean Cabot grabs onto her husbands arm in fear of the two black men, simply because they are black. After this incident, Jean Cabot wanted to change her locks on the doors of her house. Still emotionally overwhelmed and scared about her car being hijacked, she noticed the locksmith changing her locks happened to be Mexican. She quickly assumed that he was a “gang-banger because of his shaved head, prison tattoos and his pants around his ass” and she was certain that he was going to sell one of their keys to his “homeys.” Simply by the way he looked and because of his culture, Jean Cabot was quick to come to a racist and false conclusion about the locksmith. A third example of racism and stereotyping we see in the movie comes from John Ryan, the older and more experienced police officer. In one of the first few scenes that we see Ryan, he is driving with his newly assigned partner, Officer Tom Hansen. They hear over the police intercom that there had been a hijacking of a black truck. Ryan and Hansen continue driving and happen to see a black truck ahead of them. Seeing that the couple driving the truck was black, Officer Ryan immediately became suspicious and pulled the truck over. He asked the couple to step out of the vehicle and the wife, Christine Thayer, became aggravated. To assert his dominance as a white, male officer, Ryan molested Thayer in front of both her husband and Officer Hansen. All of these racist acts revolve around the stereotype about different people in society,