Abnormality:Yesterday,Today, as Dictated by Corporations, Advertising, Merchandising and Political Pressure.

Less than a century ago, before and after the Second World War; if a father "disciplined" his misbehaving son with a vicious beating, if a school principal or class room teacher gave a student "the strap" with a piece of machine belting or gave them a "crack" across the side of the head with a steel edged ruler; most of his neighbours, most parents, would have considered his behaviour quite proper.Today, he would be guilty of child abuse and could go to jail.


As recently as the 1950s, a woman who decided that she would rather have a professional career than marry and bring up children would have been considered by most people--psychologists included-- to be in need of psychotherapy. A woman living in a common law "relationship"was considered to be slightly immoral and a young girl that engaged in sexual intercourse before marriage was considered "easy" and a slut--if she became pregnant, she was something to be hidden away out of sight. Today, we accept her decision as a valid personal choice or a method of survival.


Ideas about acceptable behaviour change over time, sometimes slowly, often--especially if some corporation government or "visible minority"sees an opportunity for control, dominance, economic gain, or world power.


In our time, we tend to be protective of children and fairly tolerant of women who occupy untraditional social roles. Similarly, ideas about psychological abnormality change from century and from society to society. Abnormality, madness, lunacy--by what ever name--there is no "right" or "wrong"--it is a relative concept.


ABNORMALITY AND SOCIETY


When we ask how the general public and society defines abnormality, what we are asking is where that society draws the line between acceptable and unacceptable patterns of thought and behaviour at this time in history. There are several different measuring sticks for acceptability, but perhaps the most commonly used are  the society's norms and the norms that have been imposed upon that society.Nothing is illegal or unacceptable--ever assassination and murder; if enough businessmen of power and wealth want it.


Every human group lives by a set of "norms"--rules telling us what is "right" and "wrong" to do, and when and where and with whom. Such rules circumscribe every aspect of our existence, from our most far-reaching decisions down to our most prosaic routines.


Consider, for example, the very ordinary act of eating. Do we eat whatever we want, whenever and whenever we want it? No! We do not. Eating is governed by a very strict set of norms as to what is"good for us to eat"--as governed by the manufactures and their advertising agencies, how often we should eat--government food guide lines,how much we should eat--our doctors and of course the government food guidelines, and where we should eat. Eating at a basket ball, football, hockey, rock concert is fine, but eating at a symphony concert is not. Furthermore, there are rules as to when and where certain things can be eaten. Eating food purchased from a food-cart, a hamburger, a slice of pizza, on the street is acceptable. Gnawing on a whole ham is not. Drinking wine with dinner is acceptable; drinking wine with breakfast would be considered a sign of alcoholism.Franks and beans at a barbecue are fine; franks and beans at a banquet are not.


It is important to note that; some cultures even have strict rules about whom one can eat. Certain tribes, for instance, prohibit eating in the presence of blood relatives on the maternal side, since eating makes one vulnerable to being possessed by a devil. and such devils are more likely to appear one is in the presence of ones maternal relatives--many North Americans have the exact same belief but for a different reason.


To outsiders, who do not know and understand the conditions under which they developed, such norms may seem add and unnecessarily complicated--not what THEY are used to -- but adults who have been raised in the culture and who have assimilated its norms through the process of socialization simply take them for granted.
MANUFACTURES AND ADVERTISING AGENCIES USE SIMILAR TACTICS OF "BLANKETING" OR "FLOODING" THE MEDIA; ESPECIALLY TELEVISION, AND SOCIALIZATION, TO CREATE FADS, AND TO SELL,THEIR ITEMS.
Far from regarding them as merely as folk-ways, they regard them as what is right proper and desirable. And consequently they will tend to label as abnormal anyone who violates these norms.
WE ESPECIALLY SEE THIS WITH THE USE OF COSMETICS AND HAIR COLOURING; FIFTY YEARS AGO THEY WERE USED BY ACTORS AND ACTRESSES, ON THE STAGE--DIGNIFIED WELL RAISED "LADIES" DID NOT USE THEM, EXCEPT ON "SPECIAL" OCCASION--  ANY WOMAN APPEARING ON THE STREET OR ESPECIALLY AROUND ANY KIND OF DRINKING ESTABLISHMENT WAS THOUGHT TO BE OF "QUESTIONABLE MORALS. TODAY, BECAUSE OF ALL THE "BECAUSE WE'RE WORTH IT" COMMERCIALS, IT IS THE WOMAN WHO DOES NOT USE THEM HEAVILY ON AN ONGOING EVERY DAY BASIS THAT IS CONSIDERED DOWDY AND A "LITTLE ODD".


But, the United States OF America has always made celebrities out of: assassins, bikers, "cool hands", non-conformists,  dictators, fakers, gangs, general misfits, hoods, murderers, rapists,  and "rebels without a cause". Out of their deep seated paranoia; and as a cover-up-- for their repressed feeling of inferiority; the USA idolizes--indeed worships-- the criminal element and the misfits. I can only deduce that to not do so would; in many ways, be hitting a little too close to home--like taking a "cheap shot" at themselves.


In a small, highly integrated society, there will be little disagreement over norms. In a large, complex society , on the other hand, there may be considerable friction among different "special interest" groups over the question of what is "right and proper". 
For example the Gay and Lesbian movement may be conceptualized as the effort of one group to convince society as a whole to adjust its norms or to accept homosexuality as the norm.
In a sense, the use of norms as a standard for anything may be inappropriate. Norms are not universal and eternal truths; on the contrary, as we have seen they vary across time and across cultures and they can be changed, more or less  at will by the rich , opportunistic, and powerful.