[Book Reviews] [Sociology] "Culture of Honor"

[thewronghands]

In talking with one of my male friends earlier this week, he was apologizing for schedule-wrangling, and I said, "Don't worry about it! Everybody knows that you're a man of your word." This was totally the right thing to say. A couple of days later, I had a discussion of the concept with one of my boyfriends. He, too, strongly values both being

Comments

[haikujaguar]

Oddly, I have "to be honorable" as a deep subconscious requirement; friends joke that this manifests as a "lawful good" alignment and have watched me war with doing things I want to do versus doing what is proper. But I did not get it from some weird Scots-Irish background? o_O Or even from the South, though I grew up there. I got it from my parents, who through Cuba got it from Spain. "Bastard" in my family was a serious insult. When we got the Serious Lectures from my father, it was about dishonoring our family name. He did not have any sons, so I suppose the two of us had to receive the European Nobility male virtues in their stead.

[thewronghands]

Interesting! I also got a ton of "be honorable" as a child, though for me it was growing up in Southern military culture. I got it less heavily than my brother did, being female, but in a weird way that was sort of the feminism of my childhood -- my assertion that I *could too* be honorable and strong and rescue people and such, even though I was a girl. Those were the traditionally-assigned virtues expected of men, and what pretty much everyone in the military and their families thought that the military did. At least, as seen through the eyes of a child. I grew up being told that America's military were a bunch of people who put themselves in harm's way at great personal risk to help the world, and that for that reason this was among the most honorable of professions. It wasn't until I was much older that I learned that there were cases where that wasn't always so, and life got a lot more complicated at that point. (See also: cops. Or any authority structure where there's corruption, or where good people can be ordered to do

[larksdream]

Is it centrally important to you to be a person of your word

Extremely so. I try very, very, very, very hard not to lie, including white lies / social lies.

While I'm fine with physical self-defense, I think it needs to be justified with an actual or imminent physical threat. I can make up weird edge-case examples that aren't, but it's hard for me to get even close to "it's okay to shoot someone for verbally insulting you". (Punch, maybe sometimes, depending. :P )

[thewronghands]

I also try to avoid social lies, which gets extremely awkward at times when people seem determined to make you say the expected but totally untrue thing or make a big scene about it.

I basically agree with you on self-defense, with the caveat of also including a physical response being okay to such a threat to others. (So, if they are punching my friend, it's also okay to intervene to stop that. They don't have to be throwing the punch at me for me to take action to protect the person who doesn't want that fight. If it's two people who want to be punching each other, though, not much I can do about that. So I don't want to get involved in monkey dances, but I do want to help prevent assault and battery.)

[stolen_tea]

I used to be more concerned with doing what I said I'd do come hell or high water. I have since loosened up somewhat, and have focused more on allowing myself to spontaneously express myself (e.g., "That's the best thing ever!" and "Oooh, let's do that!), without viewing them as anything more than expressions of enthusiasm. If I really mean something, I'll most likely say "I promise you that ...", but that's pretty rare; most people aren't looking for a level of certainty that would cause me to miss, say, a wedding or a funeral. Adapting to circumstances seems a higher virtue than holding steady to a decision made with inferior information. (That said, there is also value in being able to stick with a plan. The question is, how much value is there in forcing yourself to continue something that you've discovered is a bad idea

[thewronghands]

I went through a phase in college of being a strict literalist, but after some considerable stress realized that it was not practical. Sometimes circumstances change in such a way as to make one's "sure, I'll see you at dinner at eight!" of impractical truth. Traffic happens. People get sick. Sometimes plans need to be shifted accordingly, and that's okay. I extend the understanding to others there that I hope they would extend to me if the shoe was on the other foot.

[docstrange]

"violent acts among Southern white men being positively correlated with less fertile lands settled by Gaelic people from herding cultures"

Well... That is more or less the origin of the first wave of concealed weapons laws in the various states.

Re: Of one's word - I think that's an old construction (and yes, like many old constructions it has much resonance and its wording probably has some ability to continue to shape assumptions), given I know the phrase "[his|her] word is good" is also fairly prevalent. Same thing? Probably not. But related? Yes. The older construction will fade or adapt to permit "woman of her word" and other variants unless our actual society will continue to dovetail with the phrase.

[thewronghands]

Re: origin of laws, in the South or in general?

Re: shifting constructions, I do occasionally try to update such things to be more inclusive. [grin]

[docstrange]

In general. Though they start in the south and show up in IL and IN, the south of which is "southern" in culture - meaning scots-irish dueling culture.

[miss_adventure]

Is it centrally important to you to be a person of your word,

Yes.

or do other values trump that?

Saving the world, although I still would probably pay a price for it.

Does that have anything to do with how you perceive honor?

Yes.

Is this related to your views on acceptable or justified violence?

No.

[thewronghands]

[nods] I'm pretty much with you on these, with the abovethread additions on gradations of intention-of-strictness-of-truth folded in. "I would love to have tea after work, I should be free at five!" is a lot less strict than "I promise I will be there at five to go to your divorce hearing with you", for example. For the former, I'll leave for tea after work and send a text if I'm going to be late. For the latter, I will leave work hours early if I have to to make sure I make it. So, basically it's a combination of what the circumstances were when I said that, what they are now, and the seriousness of the intention/promise. I try to adapt to changing circumstances on the fly as gracefully as I can, but some promises are the levers around which we move our worlds.

[miss_adventure]

Exactly. Nicely put.