An Individual and the Wider Society, Essay Example

The relationship between an individual and the wider society is experience, what happens to an individual is usually based on what that person is experiencing in society. For example, a person who has a job that pays $100,000 a year, a big house, 3 cars and a 401k can instantly lose all of that because there has been a change in society where whatever job that the person was doing is no longer needed or the contribution that the person is making is no longer needed. This forces people to get food stamps/welfare in order to live and be able to support their families, the person is then at the mercy of society. It can be argued that the wider society is the cause of and solution to a lot of people’s problems, an example of this when society decides that having a big house is unnecessary because it’s too expensive but a person who has a growing family would disagree and act otherwise. Society is, for lack of a better phrase, the decider of mankind’s fate.

Social circumstances affect people in a way that forces them to do things outside of what they consider to be the ‘natural order of things’. Social circumstances can make a rich person poor and make a well to do family a needy one, an example of this is when people have to rely on public transportation to get to work and the grocery store; this messes with a person’s independence as well as their ability to be able to take care of themselves.

Another example of this is when a person needs the government’s help via food stamps to feed their family, this compromises a person’s ability to provide without governmental aid.

The person I am today is someone who has accomplished much and happy to say, has no criminal past or background because of the positive parental influence as well as the positive environment thatI grew up in. I feel that if I grew up in a different place then I probably wouldn’t have accomplished as much as I could have and I would never know my true potential nor care about how I could use that potential to make my mark on the world, I would never know what it means to use your innate ability to do great things for not just yourself but for other people.

It can be argued that growing up around different people other than the ones I grew up could’ve had a huge negative impact on my academic future, I could’ve grown up around people who think that being uneducated is not that big of a deal and that lack of academic motivation could inspire me to be just as everyone around me is. The problem with this is that it can become generational, I might teach my children the same things that I was taught being around the same people that were different from the ones I grew up with. Growing up around different people doesn’t necessarily mean that the experience would’ve been bad, but it does mean that I don’t feel like it would’ve been of any benefit to me.

Growing up in a different environment could either work to my advantage or disadvantage, an example of this is if I was to grow up in an environment where it was nothing but negative energy and fisticuff brawls. I would adopt the same lifestyle and feel like that’s all life is, a continuous fight; I wouldn’t be so inclined to do positive things with my life. It can’t be argued that if I grew up in a different environment, I would be a completely different person as would anyone growing up in an environment that’s different than their own.

Another example of this is when someone who grows up around positive people who are negativity free live lives of greatness and positivity.