Falling Down Sociology

Falling down is a powerful movie. It touches on aspects of society that will always exist among us and we all have to put up with each day. This movie represents a monster that I cannot help but to sympathize with. Many may view this movie as a social commentary or a sort condemnation of our modern society. But on a personal level, I believe it represents the degree of frustration within each of us. It shows how little control we have on what is going on around us in terms of socioeconomics, ethnics and local government aspects.

The movie starts with D-fens sitting in his car stuck in traffic, no AC, loud music and loud children on a school bus. This ultimately leads him to abandon his car in the middle of traffic and decides to walk home.

During his journey, He encounters a series of events that exacerbate his frustration with the system. He encounters a liquor store owner (Korean), D-fens get s outraged by how over priced merchandises got , to a point that a can of soda almost costs a dollar. On a political level, this scene shows how little the local government does in regulating monopolies to protect the consumer’s rights. He then, encounters couple of gangsters (Latino) that tried to rob him at park that had gang marks all over it, but he effectively thwarts their attempt. As for this scene, A comprehensive study of hate crimes in Los Angeles County released by the University of Hawaii in 2000 concluded that while the vast majority of hate crimes nationwide are not committed by members of organized groups, Los Angeles County is a different story. Researchers found that in areas with high concentrations, or "clusters," of hate crimes, the perpetrators were typically members of Latino street gangs who were purposely targeting other ethnicities.
Furthermore, the study found, "There is strong evidence of race-bias hate crimes among gangs in which the major motive is not the defense of territorial boundaries against other gangs, but hatred toward a group defined by racial identification, regardless of any gang-related territorial threat." As he walks out of the park, he passes by a bank that has a man (African American) standing in front of it with sign in his hand that has “not economically viable” written over it.

This scene explains how biased many institutions can be, and how absurd it is to see that your racial ethnicity may determine whether or not you’re a profitable project to invest in. this scene may have helped spurring prop 209 which prohibit public institutions from discriminating on the basis of race, sex, or ethnicity. Then he goes inside a gun store that is owned by neo-Nazi enthusiast. The owner thinks D-fens is a member but was proven wrong. This scene may explain how whites think minorities/immigrants are taking over major cities turning whites into minorities. Furthermore, the scene highlights an explanation as why many Americans concerned about illegal immigrant, but this also leads to a mix up between legal and illegal immigrants when viewed by white majorities. Speaking in terms of our previous discussions, many Americans believe that legal/illegal immigrants are living off public benefits and do not contribute in any ways to the publics good. The subject may have helped spurring proposition

187.A Passage of Proposition 187 reflected state residents' concerns about illegal immigration into the United States and the large Hispanic population in California. Opponents believed the law was discriminatory against immigrants of Hispanic or Asian origin; supporters generally insisted that their concerns were economic: that the state could not afford to provide social services for so many illegal residents. Later on, D-fens leaves the store to get breakfast at a burger joint. He holds up the burger joint and later on he orders lunch. He compares the actual sandwich to the picture and finds it falsely advertised. The picture is touched, rebuffed to make it more appealing. Then he encounters bunch of construction workers working on fixing a pipeline, causing heavy traffic congestion. He questions one of the workers about the true reasons behind the project, he then argues that it’s just a matter of funding from the government that must be spent on something. This scene shows how corrupt politics and government can get by spending money solely for the purpose of spending. The movie ends with detective Prendergast shooting D-fens and putting an end to what seems to be a vigilante in the eyes of the law.
As for the statement, "The City's great diversity in more equitable ways, whiteness will lose its saliency as a defining principle of urban culture an identity." My point of view is shifting toward agreeing with the above statement.

My personal experience shows the impact of diversity on the environment that I live in. diversity slowly turns any environment into a melting pot, furthermore, culture diversity will heavily reduce the impact of any dominant race that has a continuous influx of other ethnic minorities. From the above statement, we can deduce that the identity and culture of the dominant race will lose its

saliency.

In conclusion, "Falling Down" is not meant to be seen as the anatomy of a madman, but as a spectacle of civil despair in which some people give in to galvanizing self-pity and others cope as best they can. Among these is Mr. Duvall's Detective Prendergast, a policeman whose career has been hobbled by the demands of a needy wife. By chance, this is the detective's last day on the job before he takes early retirement. Without making a big thing out of it, the movie suggests that D-Fens and Prendergast have some resentment in common.