Examining Crime And Gender Crimes Committed Criminology Essay

Examining Crime And Gender Crimes Committed Criminology EssayCriminology has treated wo manpowers role in crime with a cosmic measure of indifference. The intellectual tradition from which criminology derives its conception of these sexes maintains esteem for mens autonomy, intelligence and force of character while disdaining women for their weaknesses of compliance and passivity. Women who conform as pure, obedient daughters, wives and mothers benefit men and society (Feinman, 1994 16). Those women who dont, that is ar non-conforming, may simply be one who questions established beliefs or practices, or one who engages in activities associated with men, or one who commits a crime. These women are doubly damned and doubly deviant (Bottoms, 1996 1). They are seen as mad not bad (Lloyd, 1995 36). These behaviors frequently lead to interpretations of being mentally abnormal and unstable. Those doing the defining, by the very act, are never defined as other, but are the norm. As men are the norm, women are deviant. Women are defined in character reference to men (Lloyd, 1995 xvii). In the words of Young (1990), sexual difference is one of the ways in which normal is label out from deviant (Young, 1990 ix). So wherefore do these differences exist inwardly the cruel justice system and society as a whole? In order to understand why anger and punishment differs between genders it is important to acknow directge and analyses past perceptions, theories and perspectives from predominant sociologists and criminologists of that time towards women in society.Up until the turn of the century, women were primarily perceived as sexual objects and pass judgment to remain within anthropoid dominated ideologies such as homemaker, carer and nurturer taking second place after men (Oakley, 1985 56). Women who strayed from the norm were severely punished, void of some(prenominal) opportunities to explain their actions. Perhaps interventions from Elizabeth Fry in the early n ineteenth century campaigning for women to be housed in separate prisons from men and offered rehabilitation could be marked as the starting point for intense studies being conducted into relationships between women and crime. The conception at that time was that women must be protected from, rather than held responsible for their criminal actions. Unfortunately, such intervention only caused coaxing rather than coercion, that is, women became segregated even more as individual members of their community (Bardsley, 1987 37).Later in the late nineteenth century, Lombroso and Ferrero (1895) wrote a book called, The Fe young-begetting(prenominal) Offender. Their theories were based on atavism. Atavism refers to the belief that all individuals displaying anti-social behavior were biological throwbacks (Smart, 1978 32). The born female criminal was perceived to film the criminal qualities of the male plus the worst characteristics of women. According to Lombroso and Ferrero (1895), the se included deceitfulness, cunning and spite among others and were not apparent among males. This appeared to indicate that criminal women were genetically more male than female, therefore biologically abnormal. Criminality in men was a common feature of their natural characteristics, whereby women, their biologically-determined nature was antithetical to crime. Female social deviants or criminals who did not act according to pre-defined standards were diagnosed as pathological and requiring treatment, they were to be cured or removed (Lombroso and Ferrero, 1895 43).Other predominant theorists such as Thomas (1907) and later, Pollack (1961), believed that sin was a pathology and socially induced rather than biologically inherited. As Thomas (1967) says, the girl as a child does not know she has any specific value until she learns it from others (Thomas, 1967 68). Pollack (1961) believed, it is the learned conduct from a very young age that leads girls into a masked character of fe male criminality, that is, how it was and still is concealed through under-reporting and low detection rates of female offenders. He further states, in our male-dominated culture, women stick out always been considered strange, secretive and sometimes dangerous (Pollack, 1961 149). A greater folly towards women by police and the justice system needs to be addressed especially if a true equality of genders is to be achieved in such a complicated world .Although it may be true that society has changed since the days of Lombroso and Ferrero, past theories appear to remain within much of todays criminal justice system. Women have so some(prenominal) choices of which they didnt before. It would appear naive to assume that women and crime may be explained by any one theory. Any crime for that matter, whether male or female, may not be explained by any one theory. It is an established and non-arguable fact that males and females differ biologically and sociological influences, such as gender-specific role-playing appears to continue within most families. Its a matter of proportion not difference. According to Edwards (1984), the enemy is within every woman, but is not her reproductive biology, rather it is the habit regarding it into which she has been led by centuries of male domination (Edwards, 1984 91).Many argue, the main culprit for aggression as seen in many men is testosterone. This hormone appears responsible for much of the male crime, even in todays society of increased knowledge on the subject. In contrast, extensive research over the past twenty-five years done on the testosterone/aggression link focusing on prenatal testosterone predisposing boys to be rougher than girls, concluded it was very difficult to show any connection between testosterone and aggressive behaviour (Lloyd, 1995 26). Cross-cultural studies of ninety-five societies revealed fourty -seven percent of them were free of rape while at least thirty-three societies were free of war and interpersonal violence was extremely out of date (Meidzian, 1992 74). Based on these studies, it may be evident to suggest that sociological factors and environmental influences appear to have greater credibility in explaining criminal behaviour, whether male or female.As most women commit crimes of a lesser violent nature such as shop-lifting, leniency is given to them from law enforcement officers and judges. It is true that many women use their femininity to their advantage which makes it very difficult to argue equal rights for both sexes (Lloyd, 1995 56). This unequal position of women in society due to social oppression and economic dependency on men and the state, needs to be addressed. Offences by women remain sexualised and pathologised. In most ways, crimes women commit are considered to be final outward-bound manifestations of an inner medical imbalance or social instability. Their punishment appears to be aimed principally at treatment and resocialisation (Edwards, 19 84 216). The victimisation of women in medicine seems to be for her hold good or in her best interests.Changing social and economic conditions, environmental influences, cultural traditions and physiological factors must be taken into account when traffic with crime. It has only been over the last thirty to fourty years that women have empowered themselves and fought for equality within all areas of society. After so many centuries of oppression and inequality, these changes force out not be expected to happen over night. It is essential that society be well informed in the quest for justice. Creating a framework that is genuinely equitable requires a proper understanding of life beyond the courtroom door. The world is infused with gender bias and no single explanation exists for human behaviour or passivity or aggression. A complex interplay of cultural and biological factors makes people as individuals. Behaviour may be changed. All have the voltage for aggression and complia nce. The view that women are other, inferior and unstable because of their hormones and emotions makes it all too easy to see them, by their very nature, as unstable, irrational, neurotic and MAD.Bardsley, B. (1987) Flowers in hell on earth an investigation into women and crime, Pandora Press, London.Bottoms, A. (1996) Sexism and the Female Offender, Gower Publishing, Sydney.Carrington, K. (1993) Offending Girls, Allen and Unwin, Sydney.Edwards, S. (1984) Women on Trial, Manchester University Press, New Hampshire.Feinman, C. (1994) Women ion the Criminal Justice System, Praeger Publishers, Westport.Lloyd, A. (1995) Doubly Deviant, Doubly Damned, Penguin, Sydney.Lombroso, C. and Ferrero, W. (1895) The Female Offender, Fisher Unwin, London.Miedzian, M. (1992) Boys will be boys Breaking the tie in Between Masculinity and Violence, Virago Press, London.Oakley, A. (1985) Gender and Society, Adlershot Gower, London.Pollak, O. (1961( The Criminality of Women, A.S. Barnes, New York.Smart, C. (1978) Women, Crime and Criminology, Routledge London.Thomas, W. (1967) The Unadjusted Girl, Harper and Row, New York.Young, A. (1990) Femininity in Dessent, Routledge, London.