Society sets standards for individuals or individuals set standards for society; which is better?
596979
society sets standards for individuals.\na few people come up with a trend and then thousands are following it.\nit's hard to be an individual when there's so much bull***** being thrown into your face. i'm a girl, so society demands that i be super skinny and have big, fake boobs. since i look mexican, i just be a lazy, wellfere diggin' whore. since i'm an american, i must be fat, be in deeeppp-debt, and own a gas guzzling SUV. since i'm young, i must be into Mtv and fashion, and everything else that's hip.\nI am none of these. and i work very hard not to fall into the mainstream of things.\n  groupthink is a bad thing.\nbeing a lemming or sheep is just as bad.\nSometimes we need to go against what society says because it's wrong. Remember, the holocaust? or the cold war? \n  We as individuals must learn to think on our own if we trully want to survive in this filthy drone world.
118958
I believe people shape a society.  A family is the base of a good society.
1157830
All people are equal,\nyet not all are treated equal.\n\nAnd that is the difference.
301235
The nice thing is that Utopia is different for each person and therefor each person has the chance for their own Utopia to exist. That said, in the world which we live in today I can't say if a "perfect world" can exist anymore or ever really has. But every individual person has the ability to look into their heart and mind and then create their own "perfect world" however they want to.
751965
Values are personal goals or morals that individuals believe in or go by and there is no right or wrong. There is no "bad" or "good"value.\nEthics are societal norms that society as a whole heeds to and can be violated against. Ethics can only be "good", not bad.
915803
=because even though this is a free country, and we refer to free society, government and society rule all of us because "they" know what is best for each and every one of us!!!  Evidently we are not responsible enough for decision making, so "they" do it for our own well being.
365621
Both seek to decide what is right and wrong. Ethics is more of a personal opinion. Law is the collection of views of society members.
237954
Well, when you look at either system, you are placing society at the mercy of its greatest enemy---man.  Agreed, some people are ready to function in a civil setting, love and care for their fellow man, etc.  Now, when you look at it from the x-facvtor of humanity it would seem that both systems are about as good as each other---one relies on possibly evil individuals, the other relies on a possibly evil governemnt.  Me, personally, I tend more towards libertarianism, I guess it's just the pessimist in me, but I'd rather face a CEO without any caring, than a far-reaching government without caring.  And once they get all of their good ol' boys in, there's no stopping them.  Under social democracy, you have to leave the country, under libertarianism, you may have to leave your job or a city.  Oh well, as the French said, LASSIEZ FAIRE!
334285
Yes it does, just look around.  Society expects certain actions and attitudes from all of us.  Our society demands certain behavor in all of us.  The price of not conforming to some of these expectations is just too high for most folks.
296809
All PhD qualified personnel, have immeasurable value, that cannot be quantified for arbitrary comparison. What society wants to evaluate is your competence to apply your knowledge for the good of society - the more good you do to society through application of your knowledge, the more you are likely to be rewarded by the societies concerned.
1036216
Kindness is more important. Though modern society is plagued by cynicism. It is more to the core of who we are.
174916
The answer is based in ones cultural boundaries, societal values, behavioral (learned) expectations, and socio-economical in nature.\n\nSo complex.  \n\nCommon denominator:  Each society dictates what is acceptable.  Most behaviorists would answer your question by saying that we are conditioned to a response.  The good news is that faulty thinking can be unlearned, as well as learned stereotypical responses.
175283
A society is a self-perpetuating grouping of individuals occupying a particular territory, which may have its own distinctive culture and institutions. The term is most commonly used to describe human societies, although it may be used to describe animal societies. The term may refer to a particular people, such as the Nuer, or to a nation state, such as Austria. In political science, the term is often used to mean the totality of human relationships, generally in contrast to the State, i.e., the apparatus of rule or government within a territory.\n\n    "I mean by it [State] that summation of privileges and dominating positions which are brought into being by extra-economic power... I mean by Society, the totality of concepts of all purely natural relations and institutions between man and man..." - Franz Oppenheimer, The State.[1]\n\nThe social sciences generally use the term society to mean a group of people that form a semi-closed social system, in which most interactions are with other individuals belonging to the group. More abstractly, a society is defined as a network of relationships between social entities. A society is also sometimes defined as an interdependent community, but the sociologist Tonnies sought to draw a contrast between society and community. An important feature of society is social structure, aspects of which include roles and social ranking.
398264
I think equality and freedom are two very distinct and separate issues.  Every human being on this earth should have and know freedom.  Equality (as defined) can never be settled because there is always a person, a group or a mass that believe themselves to be superior.  So, in a perfect world, all people would be free to be themselves and do their best and equal to each other simply by being Human Beings.
47184
The Standard of living refers to the quality and quantity of goods and services available to people. It is generally measured by real (i.e. inflation adjusted) income per person, although sometimes other measures may be used; examples are access to certain goods (such as number of refrigerators per 1000 people), or measures of health such as life expectancy.
622738
Each society has their own value system. And to each of us it looks strange of the other society. That is where a very important word and belief comes in. It is called tolerence!
110251
Living in societies poses a series of limitations to us. In the real world we have to be diplomats so as not to offend none of the several existing points of view, for example.\n\nAlso societies punish and/or ostracyze their members who don't share the opinions that these societies think they should have.\n\nHonesty and frankness are virtues, but unfortunately being too honest and too frank often brings us problems.