Our Guys

In “Our Guys,” Bernard Lefkowitz depicts a world of murky adolescents whose parents
had no idea concerning their predatory behaviors. The young and widely celebrated teenagers
embraced a culture of abuse. They formed a group that would abuse and even humiliates young
teenage girls. They held destructive parties, and despite all the havoc that they caused to the girls
who fell victim to their parents and the two at large continued to embrace them and praise them
for their celebrity status. However, the athletes received unqualified adulation, which messed
with them even more. In one incident that marked the end of their immoral acts, the teenage boys
sexually molested a young teenage girl who was also mentally retarded.
It is unfortunate that such a town as Glenn Ridge could harbor such people of despicable
character. However, the main issue is that parents and society at large started treating the teenage
boys like celebrities as opposed to teenagers who were still developing and needed a lot of
guidance and molding to grow upright. Reading the story, I am not surprised that the town
produced boys that were capable of molesting young girls. In fact, the parents are quoted
referring to the girl as flirty despite the fact that she was abused. Victim shaming is evident in the
story as even other students felt that the girl was promiscuous. Even after being raped, the blame
is on the victim and not the perpetrators. This is because society gave them a higher status and
could not imagine placing blame on them.
“Our Guys” were influenced by peer groups as one of the agents of socialization. In this
context, peer group refers to the group of boys who spent time together and had an influence on
each other’s beliefs and behavior. Members of a peer group tend to have age, interests, and social
positions in common. All the boys were teenagers, participated in athletics, and attended

destructive parties. The issue is that in the whole incident, there were actual participants or the
boys who raped the girl, would-be participants, as well as observers. The school is made up of
teenagers who have corrupted each other’s morals. Even those that never actually raped the girl
were willing to remain silent and protect the culprits. It is also possible that they never saw
anything wrong in what their peers had done.
The other agent of socialization is community. The community in which the teenagers in
“Our Guys” were raised directly harbored immoral boys. The influence on the boys cannot be
accounted only by peer influence—the community within which they were raised shaped them
into young dysfunctional boys. The author wonders about the privileged American society and
how it had raised its children, specifically the sons. The silence of all the kids is baffling. It is
hard to understand why all the adolescents that heard about the incident chose to remain silent.
However, even the adults did not condemn it, and this informed the adolescents’ attitude towards
the issue. Some even accused the victim of “asking for it.” It was a community with questionable
morals, if any.
According to Erving Goffman, life is like a continuous play with no end, and people are
the main actors. The theorist held that when we are born, we are placed on a stage which is life
on a daily basis. Socialization then begins, and it entails learning experiences on how to play
specfic roles by observing other people within the immediate environment. Humans enact their
roles when interacting with others who are also enacting roles during the interaction. Goffman
believed that whatever behavior humans depict, they are usually playing out a certain role based
on their stage in life.
Based on Goffman’s theory, it is evident that the community within which the boys grew
up influenced their behavior. The boys also influenced each other’s behavior during their many

interactions. The school and respective homes of each of the boys represent the social setting.
The community and parents in specific adored the teenagers and treated them like celebrities.
Their achievements in their field overshadowed any other aspect of their lives. The parents did
not show any concern for the boy’s behavior. They were regarded as the “golden boys,” and they
viewed themselves as grown men and celebrities who were beyond reproach. As a result, the
boys learned to get away with bad behavior. The many parties they attended also represented a
social setting where they enabled each other’s behavior.
The bad behavior had permeated the school. For instance, a student who was not even
involved in the rape incident tried to trick Faber, the victim, into admitting that she was not raped
but that she herself initiated the sex acts. This shows how the children were raised. They learned
from the community, and this had an impact on their behavior. Their sense of morality is low,
and they are unempathetic. This seems to have been reinforced at home. The adults’ reactions can
tell it all. The adults themselves blamed the victim and even attacked her character. The boys did
the same as well. Based on Goffman, the teenager’s environment had fed into their behavior, and
they were just actors enacting what they had learned from their environment.