Cherlyn: tjc09_violence AQ

In passage 1, according to the author, “Rates of criminal violence are higher in mobile and heterogeneous societies where it is hard to put down roots and establish the social glue that binds people into a community.” This means that the author thinks that people from different cultures and societies tend to resort to criminal violence as they cannot live with one another. However, I disagree with the author on this point as different groups of people from different cultures and societies are able to live together and get along with each other in harmony. This is very evident especially in my country, Singapore as Singapore is a multi-racial country and there are a large number of immigrations as well. Yet, the people are still able to live together in harmony and the rate of criminal violence is largely minimised in Singapore. For example, Singaporeans living in flats have different groups of people as their neighbours and they are still living together peacefully and some even became good friends with each other. Thus, rates of criminal violence are not necessary higher in mobile in heterogeneous societies as different group of people are able to live together as one big community.
In passage 2, according to the author, he thinks that “this angry young population is highly deculturalised and individualised” is a reason to why criminal violence is so dominant. I agree to his point that teenagers that tend to be more self-centred and only think for themselves will bring about criminal violence as they do not bother about the harmful consequences it will bring to the society. However, this is not applicable to Singapore as many Singapore youths are not individualised and deculturalised. They do care about the society and they do not think only for themselves as youths were taught since young in schools that Singapore is a multi-racial country and people do help each other out as like being one big family. Thus, although the author thinks that the young population is highly deculturalised and individualised, but it is not applicable to my country, Singapore