Socs And Greasers In The Outsiders

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Pages: 3

Socs and Greasers

The book, The outsiders by S.E. Hinton, is an amazing story about hardship, loss, and grief. In the novel, there are two main rival gangs, the Socs and the Greasers, that are fighting for status in their small community. The Socs are seen as the rich, snobby, popular group, while the Greasers are poverty-stricken, hoodlums who have never really had a good life. The similarities and differences in the book are very prominent throughout the story. Both the Socs and the Greasers are gangs who are misunderstood and stereotyped, yet they have differences in their lives and values.

To begin, the Greasers and the Socs are both misunderstood gangs trying to make a life for themselves. Take Johnny, Ponyboy, Cherry and Randy for example. Johnny and
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The Socs live on the West side of town, where it is cleaner and where most people are rich. The Greasers on the other hand live on the East side of town, where it is dirty and many people are very poor. Another difference between the Socs and the Greasers are their diverse values. The Socs value their social image and status of themselves, while the Greasers are more about their reputation and the well-being of the gang. We can use Ponyboy’s house for example. As said by Ponyboy, “Our front door is always unlocked in case one of the boys is hacked off at his parents and needs a place to lay over and cool off… He’d risk a robbery… if it meant keeping one of the boys from blowing up and robbing a gas station or something” (Hinton 105-106). This quote shows how the Greasers care more about their gang than they do their reputation. The last difference is that both the gangs feel differently. As stated by Ponyboy, “That’s why we’re separated. It’s not money, it’s feeling--you don’t feel anything and we feel to violently” (Hinton 38). This quote is explaining Ponyboy’s feelings on the differences of the Socs and the