What is Anomie?

I was talking to a friend about putting The Goodness Project on Facebook when he asked me how many "friends" it had so far. I thought about this term "friends" and how it's no good at describing something you join. So what other words would work? When you join something you become a member, but that sounds too exclusive, like once you join you get a Members Only jacket or something. I was trying to think up a name that sounded more active, something action-packed! The word combatant popped into my head and I thought that sounded pretty good. But what are we combating? badness combatant sounded silly and not accurate, we're not super heroes! Also if it weren't for bad things happening I wouldn't be the well-rounded person I am today. So I searched for better words. Then I looked up a rhyming dictionary online. I thought hey, what if there's a word that rhymes with Enemy? So it would sound like Enemy Combatant, since that is a really popular word in the media today. Then I saw it, but I didn't know it then. The first word to came up that I'd never heard was, "Anomie" pronounced "Ann - Oh - Me". I googled it and this is what I found! It was perfect. I am now an Anomie Combatant. And so can you. Sign up at www.thegoodnessproject.com

What is Anomie?

• Anomie, is an absence or diminution of standards or values (referred to as normlessness), and an associated feeling of alienation and purposelessness.
  
• Anomie is common when the surrounding society has undergone significant changes in its economic fortunes, whether for good or for worse.
  
• Most often when there is a significant discrepancy between the ideological theories and values commonly professed and what was actually achievable in everyday life.

Okay, then how about trying to show me what anomie is.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvMeB4R-CcQ

Who came up with this?

Émile Durkheim was a French sociologist whose contributions were instrumental in the formation of sociology and anthropology.

What'd he have to say about it?

"...The state of anomie is impossible whenever interdependent organs are sufficiently in contact and sufficiently extensive. If they are close to each other, they are readily aware, in every situation, of the need which they have of one-another, and consequently they have an active and permanent feeling of mutual dependence."
(1972, p. 184 [excerpt from The Division of Labor in Society])
Durkheim defined the term anomie as a condition where social and/or moral norms are confused, unclear, or simply not present. Durkheim felt that this lack of norms--or preaccepted limits on behavior in a society--led to deviant behavior.

What's this have to do with me? Here and now.

Industrialization in particular, according to Durkheim, tends to dissolve restraints on the passions of humans. Where traditional societies--primarily through religion--successfully taught people to control their desires and goals, modern industrial societies separate people and weaken social bonds as a result of increased complexity and the division of labor. This is especially evident in modern society, where we are further separated and divided by computer technology, the internet, increasing beaurocracy, and specialization in the workplace. Perhaps more than ever before, members of Western society are exposed to the risk of anomie.
Durkheim also discussed anomie's effect on the goals of individuals, as well as their corresponding happiness. As social restraints are weakened, humans no longer have limits upon their desires and aspirations. Whereas their goals were previously limited by social order and morality, the goals now become infinite in scope. But Durkheim warns that, "one does not advance when one proceeds toward no goal, or -- which is the same thing -- when the goal is infinity. To pursue a goal which is by definition unattainable is to condemn oneself to a state of perpetual unhappiness".

Okay.

Sources:
Giddens, Anthony. 1972. Emile Durkheim; Selected Writings. London: Cambridge University Press.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/anomie
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anomie
http://durkheim.itgo.com/anomie.html