Sociology final

ACT UP

Aids coalition to unleash power

Second amendment

A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.

District of Columbia v. Heller

Established that the right to bear arms is an individual right.

Us gun culture and laws in international perspective

US has highest firearm mortality rate.

Australia and gun control

Port Arthur massacre leads to national firearms agreement.

Affluenza defense

A rich kid does not understand the laws.

Crimes of the powerful

causes 14 times the cost of street crime.

Death penalty and inequality

most likely where murderer is non white and victim was white. No evidence that it deters crime.

Fees and court fines in criminal cases

Criminal defendants charged for their court fines, serve longer sentences if they cannot pay

Medicalization

How we interpret social behavior through the lens of medicine, regardless of medical necessity.

Medical inflation

Medical inflation outstrips all other forms of inflation in the US.

Black lives matter

93% of the protests were peaceful.

Public opinion about civil rights movement

That it hurts African Americans

It was like a fever vs. it was like a military campaign

They trained for it.

Strong ties vs. weak ties

Strong ties are people that are close to you. Weak ties can show you other opportunities.

Freedom summer

Mississippi Summer Project, was a 1964 voter registration drive aimed at increasing the number of registered Black voters in Mississippi.

What can we do what is civil forfeiture and why is it a problem

It is when law enforcement can take the property of people who are charged with a crime. In SC, it is often very difficult to get property back, even for people who are never convicted. Increases profits for law enforcement and harms poor people who interact with law enforcement.

What was the aids QUILT and what was it's intent

In the 1990s friends and family members created large quilt squares of people lost to AIDS and they were laid out on the Washington Mall while the names of the dead were read out. This was meant to commemorate and draw attention to how many people were lost.

Why did the state of Texas send home DNA kits with schoolchildren recently

These DNA kits were intended for identifying the bodies of children killed in school shootings, since weapons like AR-15s do so much damage that it can be difficult to identify individual bodies.

What is the affluenza defense

This is the idea that someone might get a very light sentence for a crime because the judge thinks that they are so rich that they can’t possibly understand the consequences of their actions since they’ve never faced consequences for anything in the past.

Briefly describe how homosexuality went through medicalization and demedicalization

Medicalization: “Homosexuality” was defined as a medical (mental health/psychiatric) problem as a way to stop the treatment of ”homosexuality” as a criminal matter. De-medicalization: Gay activists pushed the psychiatric community to remove “homosexuality” from the DSM to get LGBTQ identity defined as an acceptable variation of the human experience, not a mental illness.

How does the us compare in both life expectancy and health care spending relative to other industrialized countries

The US spends more on health care than any other country, yet our life expectancy is lower than many other countries.

Describe rat park. What was it and what does it mean for how we understand a serious social problem

This was an experiment where rats were given an engaging, enriched environment and they turned down addictive drugs. It shows that drug addiction is only partly physiological and is also partly the result of a social context of despair, like a rat in a wire cage.

Who has been described as generation greta? Why is this the name used for this group of people

This is a generation of young women who are climate activists all over the world. The name comes from Greta Thunberg who became well known as a teenager who led climate strikes.

What is gerrymandering and why does it matter

Gerrymandering is when congressional districts are drawn in such a way as to advantage the political party in power, and usually so that the votes of some racial/ethnic or political groups count less than others. It matters because it means systematically less political representation for some people and groups, which is anti-democratic.