So what's this 'normative' thing about anyway?

Something's just been pointed out to me that I found quite interesting/amusing. In a discussion about work my house-mate argued that if you summarise modern 'banking' as a system as objectively as possible it makes little to no sense. Her description ran as follows:

'You give the money you have earned to a group of people, a few of whom you might actually know by sight, but rarely personally. These people will then take your money, store some of it in a manner that they alone control access to (though they give you a means of access that money). You cannot retrieve all of your money at any one point. They will take some more of your money and use it to make more money for themselves. They will charge you for this entire process and for several other services along the way'.

That is, I believe, a fairly accurate summary of how storing your money in a building society or savings bank works. We haven't even touched on issues of credit and merchantile banking, and it already sounds slightly insane.

It's an interesting thought isn't it? What sounds normative to us and what may not be to others.