DISCUSSIONS
- What are the techniques of neutralization? Give examples of how a juvenile may apply these techniques when apprehended.
Neutralization techniques are a cultural means of justification that can offer criminal offenders some ways of denying responsibility for their ill behavior. A juvenile can justify deviance by denying responsibilities. Arrested youths may use denying responsibility as a technique of neutralization in several ways. For instance, the juvenile can justify deviance by accusing their background of abuse, poverty, and minimal opportunities in their area to cater for their well-being. One can also claim that in our family, we are poor such that my parents cannot put food on the table, which inspired me to commit a crime so that I can get money to buy food. The techniques used by deviant include denying injury. Young people, when arrested for committing a crime that does not cause harm to the victim, tend to justify their acts by use of denial of injury technique. For instance, they can steal some money from rich people and claim that those people are wealthy such that they cannot feel the pain of losing the amount they have taken from them. Also, the juvenile can develop a habit of skipping school to justify the act by saying that there is nobody who has been injured. Denying the victim is also another neutralization technique used by juveniles when arrested. They use the method to justify the injury they have caused to the victim, claiming that the victim deserved the nature of victimization. For example, juveniles can beat a drunkard person and cause a lot of injury to the victim. When the deviants are arrested, they can defend themselves by saying that they had to beat the victims because he or she was excessively drunkard. Juveniles can employ a technique known as condemning the condemner to justify deviance. Deviants may justify their immoral acts by claiming that the police officers are corrupt, and thus, it is worse than the crime they had committed. The last technique is appealing to higher loyalties to justify deviance. One can harm others in their endeavors to defend their friend when found committing a crime and justify by saying that they had to protect their friend.
- According to the FBI, there are now more than 33,000 violent street gangs in the United States. Using scholarly research, identify possible social and political reasons for the growth of these subcultures.
Studies show that in 2011 there were approximately 1.5 million people who were part of street gangs. The study says that 33,00 of these gangs were actively committing crimes in the United States. Some researchers associate the increase of street gangs in the United States to social and political factors. Studies found out that people in the United States joined street gangs for various reasons. Due to social problems like poverty, some individuals join the gang members to benefit from the stage-managed crime with some necessities like food. Some parents in the United States could not put food in the table, and this was on the social reason that led to the rise of street gangs to robe money so that they can buy food for their families. Also, social problems like divorce inspired many children to join gang members. Due to early divorce in United Stated, many children lacked parental love. Some individuals joined streets to compensate for parental love, which they lacked due to the separation of their parents. Street gangs live like a family full of love, which attracted children who lacked parental love at early stated due to divorce. Besides, poor political governance, which led to ineffective law enforcement by police, led to increased street gangs in the United States. Studies show that some people joined gang groups to protect themselves from violent crimes. Distrusted police led to the rise of violent crime, which made some individuals form gang groups to defend themselves from rival gangs in the region. Therefore, social injustice and political climate are the perpetrators of subcultures in society. When there is a high rate of crime in the community, people live in fear of being attacked by gangs; hence, they may resolve to form their gang group to defend their families from rival gang groups.
- What are the policy implications of Social Structure Theories?
Theories often attribute deviance to faulty social structure as the leading cause of crime in society. Clifford Shaw, in his endeavors, to put his approach in action and minimize deviance extending into the neighborhoods, he came up with a Chicago Area Project. In his research, he found out that deviants were just but young people who joined illegal activities at tender ages, usually through playing in the street. Therefore, he worked hard to increase equal opportunities to young people in the society to bring them back into successful work careers through the Chicago Area Project. The project implied mitigating social disorganization in the neighborhood slums through creating community committees composed of indigenous residents rather than professional social workers from other regions. The goals of the projects include; elevating the general appearance of the neighborhoods, offering recreational facilities for youths in the society, and indulging members of the project directly in the livelihood of the troubled young people through schools and courtroom mediation within the community. After some time, the project had a favorable implication by effectively mitigating the rates of juvenile deviance in society. Besides, Cloward and Ohlin mobilization for youth programs offered a strong example of treatment implication of subcultural theories. Mobilization for youth provided both new opportunities and direct social action to improve the necessary arrangements of the society. Through such a program, all root causes of deviance and crimes in society are adequately addressed and mitigated. Besides, Kennedy’s governance introduced both federal and state welfare programs, which offered supplement income assistance, which reduced the crime rate through equal distribution of wealth in the United States society. The redistribution of wealth reduced the crime rate because individuals joined gang groups as a result of poverty in their families. Once the poverty level was eliminated through such a program, young people detached themselves from deliquescence.
- Do you believe that there is a correlation between social injustice, poverty, and criminality? Explain your answer.
In my opinion, the root cause of criminality in a different perspective from social injustice and poverty in the community. Some scholars associate delinquency with poverty and some aspects of social injustice in society. Crimes in society lead to poverty and social injustice. For instance, when gangs robe all the property that belongs to someone, they render that person miserable, increasing the rates of poverty in society. Also, criminal acts may leave the victim injured, which may cost the huge victim hospital. In the event of settling the hospital bill, the family may run bankrupt.
Moreover, social institutions like families, churches, schools cannot thrive well in a social setting where crime is deep-rooted. Due to this scenario, there is no correlation between crime and both social injustice and poverty. In a society where corruption is prevalent, people will rarely make ends meet to accumulate substantial wealth. People in such a community will be living in fear of what tomorrow holds. Probably the gangs will come to robe the little savings, and this will make people lose morale to work hard to alleviate poverty. Besides, deviance acts are more evident outside the demographic area where they are purported to be associated with social disorganization. The study says that crime acts like rape, drug use, murder, and assault are more evident in affluent and well up neighborhoods rather than slum areas.
Furthermore, some researchers point out that white-collar crimes and cybercrime are on the rise in an affluent neighborhood but not in slums. Most of the deviants in the affluent area possess skills like hacking, which enable them to perpetrate cybercrime activities in society. People who live in the slum or who are poor do not possess digital skills which can allow them to commit white-collar crime.