There are two types of people...

of course any statement that starts off "there are two kinds of..." should be regarded with suspicion, because it likely ignores the complexity of the situation. And there are of course other kinds of people in this world. But there are two kinds I'm going to talk about today: the structuralists vs. the antistructuralists, the conformists vs. the non-conformists, the straights vs. the freaks, those who are off the bus vs. those on the bus. You get the picture. I'm not the first to make this argument.

The first group takes very well to socialization. They continue past traditions. They are up on all the latest trends and listen to pop music. They are religious, and they follow the religion of their parents. They are more likely to vote republican, although many are also democrats. Their lives progress on fairly standard paths, which vary by class and race but all involve some variation on education->job->family->retirement. They are more likely to follow the law, and less likely to have tried any drugs (except a few times in college). They uphold structures of society like marriage and the economy and they are usually perfectly happy with the status quo (except in times of crisis of course). They get upset at other people who have different values than them. They try to legislate their values, and are unfriendly to people they perceive as different from themselves. We need these people. Without them society would likely grind to a halt.

The second group are the tradition breakers. They are more likely to be atheists or agnostics or a smaller religion that their parents didn't follow, and if they are up on the latest trends, it's usually within a specific counterculture like the goth/emo/punk/hippie/whatever culture. They usually (but not always) vote democrat. Or they don't vote at all. They break the law when they think they can get away with it. They are involved in activist movements and creative pursuits. They have blogs, and they post more than just lists of what they did that day and memes. They have a libertarian bent and tent to believe that any choice is ok as long as you don't hurt another person. They are more likely to engage in alternative sexual practices, and are more likely to have tried drugs- and even if they don't or haven't, they don't mind if their friends do. At least in my experience, these type of people are usually very nice to the people they perceive as different from themselves. We need these people. Without them society would stagnate and we would not have necessary social change and progress. This group is a lot smaller than the first group.

Of course these are all stereotypes, and any one trait on either list can be combined within a single person. But in my experience, these traits tend to run together.