Word: cohens
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...great social upheaval, and partly in the nature of the vandal, who is as difficult to define as he is to catch. In New York City, for example, police make arrests in only 2% to 3% of all reported cases. The vandal's deeds, as British Sociologist Stanley Cohen of England's University of Durham has observed, are commonly described as wanton, pointless, aimless, senseless, meaningless or mindless. Cohen is one of several social scientists who think that none of these objectives really apply...
...characterize property destruction -whether it is pulling up paving stones in Paris, breaking embassy windows in Jakarta or wrecking a slum-area store in Los Angeles-with a phrase like 'reckless, ignorant vandalism' is a political judgment," Cohen has written. He agrees with Fordham University Sociologist John M. Martin that every act of vandalism carries a heavy freight of motivation and even logic-though scanalized and law-abiding citizens are not likely to appreciate either. As a classic example, the Luddites who smashed the new textile machines at the dawn of the Industrial Revolution were venting their rage...
...Much contemporary vandalism, says Sociologist Martin, is similarly vindictive, a blow struck in anger by the havenots, the oppressed and the dispossessed. "Most research into school vandalism," says Cohen, "indicates that there is something wrong with the school that is damaged. The highest rates of school vandalism tend to occur in schools with obsolete facilities and equipment, low staff morale and high boredom among the pupils...
...Moreover, Cohen argues, "wanton" destruction may be but a distorted image of a larger picture. "The values associated with juvenile vandalism and thought to be peculiar to delinquents, such as the search for excitement and kicks, the high regard for toughness and aggression, might reflect values running through the whole society...
DIED. Myron Cohen, 83, stand-up comic who was a star on the Las Vegas, Atlantic City and Catskill Borscht Belt circuit for 40 years, and a favorite of TV audiences on the old Ed Sullivan hour and the Tonight show; after a heart attack; in Nyack, N.Y. A onetime salesman in New York City's garment district, Cohen specialized in dialect stories and ethnic jokes that were sometimes blue, usually hilarious, but always gentle...