Reddit mentions of Behavior in Public Places: Notes on the Social Organization of Gatherings

> is it okay if you can provide me an example

A beautiful example of social facts is how people queue when entering a post or bank office. Erving Goffman wrote about these micro situations in Behavior in Public Places.

Imagine a physically very strong person entering a post office with a queue of some frail elderly people. If we would live in a society where the power of physical strength always rules, that strong person could look at the line, and think: “I can just push these three old ladies aside and they won’t dare to challenge me.”

Social facts are the force that makes (most) people queue. They emerge and exert their power during social interactions, even when you don’t know the other people in person. Behaving as society expects you to behave is caused by another force than a fear of the physical power of the others, or even the fear that you may be ostracized from a society. Even a person in a strange land who thinks s/he will never be in this town again, will queue. That “other force” are social facts. The word “emergent” is core here: they emerge the moment there is a group of at least two people.

People who disregard the force these social facts enacts on us would be called sociopaths.
Social facts are so strong, they can even keep sociopaths in line, especially if the social facts have the power of a state behind them.
Sociopath: “I could push the old ladies aside, but if I have to say my name when at the counter, they’ll know who I am. Even if they don’t dare to do anything while I’m here, they might call the police the moment I’ve left, and say I manhandled customers. Then I may be on a record somewhere as ‘the asshole who pushed old ladies to the ground in Pawnee.’ Better to fly under the radar.”

Yes. Most anything by Erving Goffman should interest you. In particular I recommend The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life and Behavior in Public Places.