Community standards are local norms bounding acceptable conduct. Sometimes these standards can be itemized in a list that states the community's values and sets guidelines for participation in the community. Alternatively, informal standards may be imprecisely described as "I'll know it when I see it."
Often, such standards are invoked in legal situations to resolve disputes, especially around pornography. Critics argue that puritanical moralists have used community standards to wrongly punish minorities such as homosexuals or those in interracial marriages.
Colleges and universities enforce their standards through conduct offices in their Student Affairs divisions.
Famous quotes containing the words community and/or standards:
“Stories of law violations are weighed on a different set of scales in the Black mind than in the white. Petty crimes embarrass the community and many people wistfully wonder why Negroes don’t rob more banks, embezzle more funds and employ graft in the unions.... This ... appeals particularly to one who is unable to compete legally with his fellow citizens.”
—Maya Angelou (b. 1928)
“There are ... two minimum conditions necessary and sufficient for the existence of a legal system. On the one hand those rules of behavior which are valid according to the system’s ultimate criteria of validity must be generally obeyed, and on the other hand, its rules of recognition specifying the criteria of legal validity and its rules of change and adjudication must be effectively accepted as common public standards of official behavior by its officials.”
—H.L.A. (Herbert Lionel Adolphus)