Essay UCLA Intro

We are horrified and bewildered by some of the choices of Tibias Schnauzers, who has lived a more adventurous and independent life than most of us ever will. John and Schnauzers went against the grain. Most people say they want that too, but within our everyday lives, we tend to choose to maintain social order, on both a micro (everyday life) and macro (social institutional) level, perhaps because it can be so innervating to break the rules. It is excruciating, for example, to do “nothing’ in the face of a world that demands goals and activity.

Again ND again, we choose the norm, yet say we want passion, liberation, and transformation. But if change is to happen, it must come from change in the everyday lives of our citizens, at least as much as from our social institutions. So here’s the question: Given the tendency for humans to maintain the status quo – to maintain social order as it is, even while giving lip service to desire for “change” – what is the possibility for real social change? How would it happen, and what would it look like?