With reference to gender, discuss the possible relationship between offending, victimisation and treatment within the criminal justice system
“Sex differences in criminality are so sustained and so marked as to be, perhaps, the most significant feature of recorded crime” (Heidensohn, 1996, in Newburn, 2007, p.806).
What Heidensohn (1996) means when saying this is that: when studying criminality, sex differences are the most compelling feature of recorded crime. This quote sums up why I chose to do my essay on the subject of gender and criminality.
The purpose of this essay is to discuss and raise questions about the links of gender in the context of offending, victimisation and treatment within the criminal justice system. When talking about gender, I will use official statistics and even self-report (crime) surveys to explain why these different levels of phenomena in terms of female & male offending and female & male victimisation occur. Additionally, I will use sources from different theories/theorists to back up my own interpretations of what the question is asking. The main sources that I shall use throughout the essay will be Understanding crime data: Haunted by the dark figure by Coleman and Moynihan and Criminology by Newburn. These sources will provide support for what my essay will set out to explain, with links to certain theories of different types of gendered criminality, e.g. the chivalry thesis and double deviance.
When studying criminality within gender, it is important to make sure the difference between sex and gender is established. By doing this, we are able to understand the contrasting types of behaviour that men and women adhere to, not because they are born into that specific type of behaviour through their biological sex, but rather the way society constructs the way we should behave depending on our sex, otherwise known as gender. This means, that we act in the way society wants us to act, which originally stems from our sexes but turns into our genders, as men are socially constructed to behave in a masculine fashion, whereas women are socially constructed to behave in a feminine fashion. Additionally men are socialised to be an aggressive, dominant, bread winner, whereas women are socialised to be a care-giving, nurturing motherly type of person. Consequently it doesn’t come as a surprise when we see in the official statistics that men commit more offences than women, as over history, crime has been more male associated than female. This is because “for many men, crime serves as a “resource” for doing gender” (Messerschmidt, 1993, in Treadwell, 2006, pp. 96-97).Basically, for men, crime is a way of showing off their power, showing off their masculinity to look like, quite simply, a man… to be dominant among their peers.
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Crime and Gender: Does the punishment fit? Before the jury stands the defendant. There is overwhelming evidence in the favor of the prosecution. The verdict comes back from the jury, not guilty. Why? The defendant is a woman. In our era of equal rights and civil liberties women have made great strides in their advancement and role in society, yet it seems that gender segregates when it comes to ...
When looking at offending, it is important to look at the evidence behind such assumptions of gender and crime, i.e. official statistics. As I have already said, the statistics show that men are more likely to commit crime than women, and this is also true in the sense of different types of crime, as men are more likely to commit indictable offences (serious crimes) than women. However, women are more likely to commit certain summary offences than men are, for example, shop lifting or prostitution. This is supported by Coleman and Moynihan (1996), who suggest, in their tables, that for every 75 sexual offences committed by a male, 1 female will commit a sexual offence… whereas for every 1 female committing a prostitution offence, 0.01 males will commit the same offence (Coleman and Moynihan, 1996, pp. 95-96).
So despite the stereotype of men behaving in the “masculine” way of committing crime to assert dominance, the statistics show that women are more likely to commit small, petty crimes that may not have a victim in the sense that a homicide committed by a man would. Be that as it may, we cannot take everything that is said in official statistics at face value, as this may not reflect certain individuals own experiences in offending. For example, some women have been known to escape that “feminine” role in society by committing serious, indictable offences that would be perceived as a more masculine crime. This is seen as double deviant, and is a term used when women have committed heinous crimes that go against (what is supposed to be) their very nature. Individual examples of this are child abuse/rape cases committed by Myra Hindley. This type of offence goes against the norm of how women are supposed to act in society; to commit an offence is bad enough, but against a child/children, the entities that women “should” be gentle and motherly towards, is seen as an abomination towards society. However, this theory towards gender, particularly female offending, can be argued against by saying that women are actually more able to “‘mask’ their criminality (because of a deviousness that resulted from hiding menstruation and faking orgasm)” (Pollack, 1950, in Treadwell, 2006, p.94).
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The reason I selected this topic is because I feel that today’s generation of youth and children have been led mainly because of peer pressure which sometimes cause them to make bad choices. This usually causes minors to do some things that are wrong before they think about the consequences. They should be given consideration based on their age and all aspects of their background should be looked ...
Essentially, what Pollack is arguing is that if women have the ability to fake an orgasm, then they have the ability to commit crimes in a secretive manner, e.g. shoplifting or fraud, thus being as capable as men when committing crime. This argument put forward suggests that the defining characteristics between masculinity and femininity are indeed worthless, because the care-giving, nurturing mother is as capable of committing an indictable offence as the proud, macho male is.
When measuring victimisation in relation to any aspect of criminality, it is important to realise that evidence, that is recorded in the official statistics must be taken within context. In other words, the statistics may not always fully reflect the overall picture of criminality in society. This is why victim surveys can be a useful tool when studying various results within different aspects in criminality, i.e. to go beyond what the statistics tell us; in this case, gender and victimisation. One particular example of how victim surveys can give us an understanding of the correlation between gender and victimisation would be the study of domestic violence, as not all cases of domestic violence get recorded on the official statistics. However, when studying the victimisation of domestic violence, it is still important to recognise that victim surveys have the possibility of being as unreliable as official statistics, due to one’s unwillingness to report a crime against someone they know. Walklate (1989) argues… “Domestic violence – the extent of which is believed to be under-represented in both official statistics and victimisation data” (Walklate, 1989, in Coleman and Moynihan, 1996, p.98).
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Campbell, Jacquelyn el “Intimate Partner Violence and Physical health Consequences”. Archives of Internal Medicine 162i 10 Article 7 (2002) The research was: “Intimate Partner Violence and Physical Health Consequence” where researchers were examining how violence affects a woman’s short term as well long term physical wellbeing. This study explored the area of abused and non abused women ...
In this case, women would be more likely to be in this position of not wanting to report a crime, because women are more likely to be victims of domestic violence, in distinction to men who are more likely to be the perpetuators. Past research on the topic of gendered violence has revealed that men are the main perpetuators of domestic violence due to the contrasting characteristics that men possess in relation to women. Knoblock (2008) states: “feminine characteristics include softness, cooperation and concern for relationships”… “Masculine characteristics include reason, rationality, intellect, self-control, autonomy, toughness/strength, competition, aggressiveness, and separation” (Knoblock, 2008, p.92).
So, because of these contrasting characteristics, female partners may be reluctant to leave an abusive relationship (as mentioned earlier) because they want to try to recover it. Female partners may also refuse to voice being a victim of an abusive relationship to people, because of the fear of what the outcome of the break up may possibly bring. These fears could range from the potential of losing their kids, to the fear of even more violence bestowing them. Consequently, female victims will continue their role in the abusive partnership, because of the fear of what could follow. This is sustained by Hester, Kelly and Radford (1996) who argue that women may well minimise or deny suggestions that they are victims of an abusive relationship, i.e. “When women say ‘nothing really happened’, perhaps what they are really implying is how much worse it could have been” (Hester, Kelly and Radford, 1996, in Squire, 2003, p.120).
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... victims in violent crime have probably strayed far from reality. Rather than a mature women attacked by strangers in alley ways, the average female victim ... Blacks were at a greater risk of rape or sexual assault than any other racial/ethnic group except American Indians. ... violence toward men reported at one third more frequently than for those of women (Ringel, 1997). However, women are victims far ...
It is not just domestic violence that is under reported in the official statistics and/or victim surveys, as shop lifting is an example of a crime that is under-reported by both the police and the victims of shop-lifting, i.e. retailers. Shop-lifting is predominantly a female crime. As Farrington and Burrows (1993) suggest “at some stage from apprehension to recording, there seems to be some discrimination in favour of females” (Farrington and Burrows, 1993, in Coleman and Moynihan, 1996, p.98).
This reluctance to reporting an offence of female criminality can be seen as chivalrous. The term chivalrous (or chivalry thesis) means that women are less likely to be reported to have committed a crime because of the fact that they are women. This reluctance may come from the victims of female crime (in this case, the retailers), to the police who investigate the crime, to the judges who give sentences on the crime; as judges may give lighter sentences to female offenders in contrast to male offenders, due to circumstances in the home, e.g. family responsibilities. Additionally, women are more likely to receive cautions than men are, because “women tend to commit less serious offences and to have fewer, if any, previous convictions” (Coleman and Moynihan, 1996, p.98).
However, it is unclear that discrimination in criminality is entirely in favour of females. As crimes that men predominately commit, i.e. sexual offences and domestic violence may not be reported, because of the fear that the victim will receive more violence in the relationship if they have reported it.
In the last 30 years, women’s treatment in the criminal justice system, particularly by the police force, has changed significantly, especially in cases to do with sexual discrimination and/or domestic disputes. As in the late 1970s/early 1980s, it had been argued that “agents of the criminal justice system have often tended to treat women complainants in a way that amounts to ‘secondary victimization’, especially in the case of sexual assault” (Newburn, 2007, p.823).
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Women and Men Communicate Differently The process of neo-Liberal dogmas, such as celebration of diversity and elimination of sexism, being showed up peoples throats, brought about a situation, when employment policies correspond less and less to the objective reality of interaction between genders at workplace. Men and women are expected to execute their professional duties with the same ...
This means that women’s claims of being a victim of crimes of a sexual manner were not taken in the full severity or seriousness that claims of other crimes would receive. In fact, it would be suggested that some responsibility of their victimisation would belong to them. Smith (1989) noted that advice that was given to women by the police in an attempt to avoid sexual assault almost all started with “don’t”, e.g. “don’t take shortcuts; don’t go out on your own at night”, etc. (Smith, 1989, in Newburn, 2007, p.823).
This guidance given to women has been criticized by feminists because of the implication that women need to be told to the right things, that women need to be told to avoid being a victim of crime, and if the advice is not taken, then the women is at seen to be at some fault if she has been attacked. In spite of this, there have been significant changes in the ways that the criminal justice system view crimes of a sexual nature against women. Newburn (2007) outlines that in 1984, the Women’s National Committee set about some changes to be made in the handling of female victims of sexual assault. This was an attempt to improve the “legal, medical, social, and psychological help available to women” (Newburn, 2007, p.823).
Therefore, the policing of sexual assaults was now treated with utmost urgency and importance.
To conclude, gender relates to offending, victimisation and treatment within the criminal justice system through the way in which men and women are viewed in society; how they are socialized. This socialization governs the way in which men and women behave, and the way other individuals will view men and women in society. So the socialization of men and women is indeed the cornerstone of how they act in accordance to society. This inks with criminality because men and women are directed, respectively, to act in a manner that society has lead them to act. Therefore, these contrasting characteristics of men (aggressive, dominant, etc.) and women (nurturing, caring, etc.) are the cornerstones as to how society views them in relation to them being offenders, victims, and how they are treated in the criminal justice system.
