Rituals mirror societies but selectively edit out controversial voices

Evidence

Much social theory emphasizes the community-producing effects of ritual. Rituals represent a people to itself, hold up a mirror to the group, telling the group who it is, and giving members ways of thinking (Durkheim 1915). More critical theorizing emphasizes the ways such symbolic reflections selectively sift out controversial issues (Lukes 1975; Spillman 1996), reproducing inequality and political passivity through a distorted image of the society — a parade that includes all sorts of organizations but none that represent workers or labor unions, in Lukes’ example. — Nina Eliasoph, Avoiding politics, 433

Categorization

• corroborated: 5 independent passages support this claim — Nina Eliasoph, Avoiding politics: how Americans…, 433