Men Are Aggressors And Women Are Victims

Men be Aggressors And Wo custody Are VictimsMen be aggressors and wo custody argon dupes is a very sterile go steady major power be held by the legal age of guild and by round of the first criminologists however criminology has evolved to try and take in how this stamp has come to be seen as the average indoors disgust. They in addition try exploring whether this sort out is in fact true up or whether on that point be various differences.To understand the part of this stereotype that wo custody ar victims we must(prenominal) first look into the voice of a victim. The subprogram of a victim is essential in initiating the abominable s bathroomtilyice process as the majority of offences which come to the attention of the constabulary be reported to them by victims of these offences their dickens roles inwardly the deplorable justice system ar that of reporting the horror and providing evidenced that the offence has been pull inted. This role of the vi ctim is different than in days gone by when the annoyance was controlled by individual and community self-regulation, as law-breakings were seen to be a clandestine matter mingled with offender and victim and so it was up to the victim and their family to decide if they went to court or non and would play the role of prosecuting officer rather than victim.Nils Christie (1986) explained how in the role of victim there is an ideal victim much(prenominal) as an elderly muliebrity or a child, twain seen as an ideal victim as they be seen as loose and deserving of help and cargon, on the other hand young men are seen as non as deserving of help and empathetically and so are non as apt(predicate) to be seen as true victims. This tests that the stereotype of un little women as victims and men as aggressors is not true as it whitethorn just be that men are not seen as much of victims of an offence than a woman might be.thither are some(prenominal) affectionate variables wh ich determine a persons likelihood to be a victim, one of which is sexual activity. It has been deputen from iniquity surveys that men are in actual fact to a greater extent probably to be victims of ruddy attacks simply that women are much than belike to be victimised in the home. This shows how men keepister be victims and not just the aggressors who commit the acts, nevertheless it excessively shows how women can in any case assuage be victims and that perhaps different sexs are victims of different types of attacks. For example men aged between 17 and 32 make up 7 per cent of the population but 25 per cent of all murder victims (Dorling, 2012) this is a greater contribution than women between these ages that are murdered proving how men can be much likely to be a victim than a women in certain crimes. This is true also by the fact that women are much likely to be the victim of reported and unreported sexual offences and are much likely to experience repeated unwanted attention such as straw than men. However when it comes to a intact number of crimes it can be gruelling to make judgements as to whether men or women are more likely to be victims as there are many forms on gendered crime such as forced prostitution and sex trafficking which are more likely to have young-bearing(prenominal) victims.A study conducted by the NSPCC in 2009 on people aged between 13-18 found that a terce of girls and only 16% of boys had experienced sexual ferocity (Barter et al., 2009) This shows how girls are more likely to be a victim of this type of crime although this statistics whitethorn not be entirely accurate because round people specially boys whitethorn not want to admit to creation raped as it is more humiliating because of their gender. The study also showed how 12% of boys and only 3% of girls reported committing sexual personnel against their partners (Barter et al., 2009) so this could be used to show how men are more likely to be aggressors however these statistics are related to specific crimes and not all reported crimes and so are not proof of the men are aggressors and women are victims stereotype.Men as victims challenges the victim stereotype about who can be a victim, the leave out of understanding of potential impacts on men this deprivation of sensed victimhood can have points to the lack of large-scale surveys on young-begetting(prenominal) victimisation, although these surveys may not be answered correctly as men could perceive being know as a victim as a threat to their maleness. This manner men may not answer surveys correctly as they do not want to be seen as a victim or they do not see themselves as a victim such as in cases of domestic abuse as if they were attacked by their feminine partner they may not see it as a existing crime as no actual damage was done to themselves. in that location has been a relegate of gender myopia within criminology in which advance(prenominal) crimino logists did not look into crimes committed by women, Heidensohn (1968) how this exclusion of women from criminology excluded half of society in understanding deviance and that other aspects of women and their lives are of interest to social sciences and that as gender differences are well reported in crime such as men committing more crime on the whole then women why then where they not well investigated. When criminologists did look into fe potent anger they did not go as in depth with male criminology.Cesare Lombroso was an early positivist criminologist who used physiognomy to explain why some people commit crimes creating and anthropological criminology in which crime was thought to be inherited and that poisonouss could be identified from their somatic features and that all criminals had certain physical features in common such as a smooth or weak chin and long arms. Lombroso penned a book with Guglielmo Ferrero in 1895, The womanish wrongdoer in this they tried to explai n egg-producing(prenominal) criminals. They stated how when a woman does turn to crime how she is a monster and that her wickedness must have been enormous before it could triumph over so many obstacles. They also held the belief like many of their time that women ranked overturn on the evolutionary scale than men, so were more primitive and so they suggested that young-bearing(prenominal) criminals would not be as visible as male criminals and would show fewer signs of degeneracy than males. So Lombroso and Ferrero stated how pistillate criminalism was down to their biology and a female criminal is an aberrant woman but also as they were like a man lots more ferocious (Ferrero and Lombroso, 1895). So although early criminologists were aware of female offenders they put in this down to the abnormality of a women being manlier and ferocious therefore it is not just a man who can be an aggressor. Further exploration into any other causes of female criminality bar abnormality a nd mannish traits were not much looked into until the next century after The Female Offender was published.The absence of qualitative research also recollectt that women were neglected from criminology, they are also seen and represented as helpmates rather than instigators of serious crime such as Ian Brady and Myra Hindley in the 1960s he was seen as the instigator and she as a manipulated helper in killing and hiding the murders of several children. Some criminological theories attempted to explain female offending such as the attainment theories which explain it by the fact male crime was glamo liftd in the media and further women to commit crime.Because of this lack of thought into female offenders they were often seen as abnormal to other females as a criminal cannot be neutral when the norm is taken to be male and so women are measured to the tip to which they deviated from this norm and if they did offend and then would be institutionalised for their own protection. Bec ause of this preceding(prenominal) treatment many think this leniency has carried on into the current criminal justice system causing the chivalry debate (Pollak, 1950) where a female offender might not be treated or judged as harshly as a male counterpart by a for instance a male judge who is sentencing her for a crime. This thinking of female offenders being abnormal from the rest of women reinforced the women as victims not as the aggressors stereotype and Pollak (1950) talks about this behaviour from certain women meaning them being seen as devious women. Female criminals are seen as twice as abnormal as they have gone against the fairness and also against their positive gender role this double deviance has reinforced the stereotype of women as victims so therefore they have not been twice as deviant even though in committing the same acts a man would only be seen as being deviant by going against the law and that his gender role is played along with as deviance is seen as a more male trait and and soly males are seen to be more likely an aggressor than a victim.This silence of female offending in criminology could be explained by social gender inequalities, a first base public profile as female crime could be seen as the wrong sort of crime, and it could also be difficult to accommodate gender perspectives in tralatitious criminological theories, the traditional feminisation of victimhood and masculinisation of aggression. There have been several theories and perspectives as to why women are perhaps committing more crimes such as Simon (1993) womens greater opportunities and skills increased participation in comprehend force and years of schooling, have increased their propensity to commit criminal acts, especially property and white-collar offenses. Adler (1975) explains how women seem to be becoming more fiery and aggressive and that perhaps this is why they are committing more crimes.Because of this lack of research into female offenders, fem inist criminology emerged in the 1960s and 1970s, as it could not be doubted that female criminals existed and seem to be on the bound as does female delinquency although this could be due to the media sensationalising female offenders there has been a veritable siege of cleans stories with essentially the same theme girls are in gangs and their behaviour in these gangs does not fit the stereotypical and traditional stereotype (Chesney-Lind, 1997). There are many different sub-sects of feminist scheme each dealt with specific problems such as liberal feminism which deals with discrimination. This rise of research into female criminality lead in turn to more exploration and a deeper understanding of male crime and masculinity within crime and the differences between men and women and offending showing that masculinity although perceived as a male criminal factor could also be apparent in women and that masculinity is not static and can be effected by context. There is also no cle ar effect of manly identity meaning that although aggression is seen as a manlike trait that it can be apparent in both(prenominal) sexes and thus the stereotype that only men can be aggressors is false.Feminist criminologys take is the marginalisation of women as subject matters in other criminological theories, because of the lack of theorising female offenders and then the lack of empirical investigations into the topic. The feminist brushup also includes the lack of research into female victimisation and male violence against women and they argued that the majority of attention on how the criminal justice system affects male offenders and not female offenders. They argued that criminology in ecumenic held a rather uncritical military posture towards gender stereotypes, leading to the doubly-deviant debate (Llyod, 1995). Works such as Dobash and Dobashs (1992) Women, power and Social Change challenged the mainstream ideas around vicitimology and made the various forms and extent of female victims more visible. Feminist critical review explores the gender crevice apparent within the criminal justice system which went beyond early criminologists views such as Pollaks (1950) chivalry thesis which plays upon the existing stereotypical gender roles and patriarchal determine to develop a more sophisticated gender analysis.As masculinity is seen in criminology as a male criminal contributor, the feminist criminology critique has allowed for the revealing of the power that underpins masculinity and its effect on the genders such as how males are obliged to live up to their gender role and so any criminal or deviant behaviour could be associate to them attempt to fulfil their male role. The feminist approach shows a new side that builds on gender role guess and so helps criminology to front away from strict biological explanations such as those by Ferrero and Lombroso. So masculinity is viewed as an expression of difference from feminism behaviours but masculinity becomes representative of heterosexual power in this way and is normative and valued. So the feminist critique helps to explore gender template roles. Although the feminist critique shows how deviant acts committed by males are an example of men trying to fulfil their male role, this approach also points to a hierarchy of masculine types. This masculinity is not only confined to males but masculinity can change meaning over time and so there is no single masculinity.The feminist understanding of masculinity seeks to move past the simple stereotype of men as aggressors and women as victims and instead suggests that male identities are all different and that there is diversity this way in both genders. This leads to a questioning of previous positivist biological approaches such as Ferrero and Lombrosos work and other positivist works which try to use on universal explanation for female crime and the idea of crime is maleness as a beginning point. Feminist theory has all owed for the deconstruction of the stereotypical view of men as aggressors or criminals and women as vulnerable and conformist to a victim role.However the closely consistent and dramatic findings from Lombroso not postmodern criminology is not that criminals are working class but that most criminals are, and ever so have been, men (Cain, 1989). So men in general do commit more crimes then women but this does not plunk for the stereotype of men are aggressors and women are victims as there is still room for women to be aggressors and men to be victims.Table 1http//crimlinks.files.wordpress.com/2012/11/population-in-prison-by-gender.png?w=490h=79This table shows the population in prisons by gender 30 June 2007 (MINISTRY OF JUSTICE, 2012). Each year it shows how there is a vast gap between numbers of women and men, however this may not necessarily mean men commit more crimes than women but that maybe they are more likely to commit more unpeaceful crimes and thus end up in prison a s it is a harsher sentence and women may just commit as many crimes but of a different sort such as stealing and not go to prison and be sentenced to community service.Graph 1This graph (Office for National Statistics, 2013) shows the incidents of intimate violence in the last year among adults of both genders aged 16 to 59, in 2011/12. These figures help to prove the stereotype that women are the victims are not always true as more men (2% more) interviewed reported being victims of violence than women. However 2% more women reported themselves as being victims of set out violence than men.Literature on female violence usually has two central themes. The first is that even women are just as violent as men this is hidden in some sort of faction as women should be seen as passive and men as the violent gender stereotype a small percentage of violent crime has always been committed by women (Pollock and Davis, 2005). This theory has been quashed by many writers such as Pearson (1997 ) who provides evidence of women who have killed their own children, helped killers and who killed their husbands and many other examples to show how women are violent and she argues they have always been as violent and raiding as men. This disproves the women as victims and not aggressors stereotype. There are also statistics which patronise up the women as the aggressors and committers of crime and not just men theory women commit the majority of child homicides in the United States (Pollock and Davis, 2005). However Jones (2009) argues that the women crime waves that seem to be apparent actually correlates with womens liberation movements and so women may receive different reactions from law enforcement then previous leading to increases of arrests and thus women crime waves. She also argues that the reason the women as victims and men as aggressors stereotype is still prevalent is due to men fearing powerful women, however her exposition ignores that women are less likely to murder than men so the stereotype of men being more likely to be aggressors and so commit crime is true, even though women can too be aggressors. regular(a) though women for some reason, they kill, rob, and assault much less often than men (Pollock and Davis, 2005) this makes it difficult for feminist criminology to figure out why women are less likely to be aggressors than men as no clear accordant reasons seem to exist.The second theme is that more women are becoming violent than ever before and that numbers of violent and criminal acts committed by women are increasing said to be due to womens liberation movements ever-changing socialisation. This idea is based on percentage increases in women committing and being convicted of crime however as the numbers of women who commit these crimes are so small it wont take many to seem as though there has been a large increase Schaffner (1999) is one writer who discusses a rise in violent crime among young females uses these percentage i ncreases. But she notes that the percentage increases can be influenced by small numbers she infers that the rise may be due to females witnessing violence in their own home and on the streets but these factors may not be any different to propagation gone by when women in the 19th century witnessed these same factors to that extent were less likely to commit crime.Although men are aggressors and women are victims is a rather stereotypical viewpoint it can be the case minded(p) that more men commit crimes and are in jail and thus are aggressors and that women are more likely to be a victim of certain crimes such as rape. However feminist criminologists amongst others have shown how women can also be aggressors and commit crimes, although the reasons for this is not as well know or researched as it is for men. It is also clear from crime figures that men are more likely to be victims than women of certain crimes such as murder. So men are more likely to be aggressors overall but wo men can be aggressors too and men can be more likely to be victims of certain crimes. So the stereotype of men are aggressors and women are victims does hold some merit when taken as a sweeping statement for all crime but there are certain errors in this statement when we look closer into gender and crime.