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Male Crime- Sociology - Coggle Diagram
Male Crime- Sociology
Other ideas
Wanting to take risks
Miller
Talks about the focal concerns of young W/C male such as excitement, which may lead to risk-taking behaviour and deviance.
Lyng & Katz
that it is unlikely that these working class boys have consciously decided to invert society’s values. It is more likely that they are influenced by boredom or seeking a “buzz”
The more dangerous the act is, the greater short term gratification a boy gets from it.
Proving themselves
Connell
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Hegemonic: The desired form of masculinity, breadwinner, dominance, success, ambition, independence.
Messerschmidt
Crime and deviance are, therefore, resources for achieving a strong and secure male identity.
For example, older men may affirm their masculinity, and therefore their dominant position, through a strong breadwinner identity or through beating their wife. Messerschmidt feels that domestic violence occurs when a woman undermines her partner's authority, such as by disobeying his orders or not giving him enough respect.
Messerschmidt develops Connell's three forms of masculinity and says that men experience intense pressure to abide with hegemonic masculinity. Men tend to want to "prove" their masculinity to their peers.
Young W/C boys construct their masculinity through violence and physical domination over others, because they gain status from being tough. Black, W/C boys struggle to achieve breadwinner status and therefore express their masculinity in violent street crime. Messerschmidt says that rape could be seen as a way of exerting male control using force.
He says that the situation with white M/C boys is different. They tend to be subservient at school so that they can "get by" but feel emasculated there. As a result, they express their masculinity outside of the classroom, such as in minor crimes like vandalism and theft.
Mosher
Mosher says that many men adopt "hypermasculinity" which is an exaggerated form of masculinity based on values such as competition, danger and violence.
Mosher feels that young unemployed men, in particular, may display traits associated with "hypermasculinity" as they struggle to achieve status legitimately.
For example, they might engage in sexist banter, wear gang-style clothing and possess a gun.
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Crisis of Masculinity
Mac An Ghaille
Argued that there has been a crisis of masculinity, because of the decline in traditional manual jobs. This has led, he argues, to an identity crisis, and made it easier for some males to question the need for qualifications when the jobs they would have traditionally gone into no longer exist.
Boys may turn to deviance as an outlet for their frustration, confusion and anxiety about their gender role.
Murray
Murray and other New Right thinkers argue that young boys from the underclass lack an appropriate role model because the dominant family type within this exluded social class are matrifocal single families.
The boys may then turn to the wrong individuals as role models and become influenced by their behaviour. They start to gain status in gangs.
Sex-role theory
Parsons
Some boys suffer with status anxiety because their father, as a breadwinner, spends the majority of time at work. They may then exaggerate their masculinity, which could manifest into deviant behaviour.
Parsons talks about the instrumental and expressive roles found within the nuclear family and argues that girls and boys look up to their parents as role-models, in particular, those of their own sex.
Sutherland
Sutherland says that boys are socialised into certain values such as assertiveness, extraversion and risk-taking which makes them more inclined to deviance later in life.
Biology
Lombroso
Lombroso believes that criminals have genetic abnormalities which makes them different from conformers. He links this to women mainly, and how female criminals lack maternal instincts, but it could also apply to men.
Herrnstein & Murray
Herrnstein and Murray tried to link biology with criminality. They investigated the IQ scores of prisoners and claimed that criminals had a lower IQ than the majority of the population.
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The peer group
Cohen
Talks about deviance within working-class boys who feel alienated. They are labelled with low status because of their poor academic success by their middle-class peers
The boys suffer with "status frustration" and turn to others in a similar position. They then form rebellious subcultures, in which the norms of society are subverted
For example, the subculture may encourage deviant acts such as fighting or vandalism. The boys can then achieve status in this way, having failed in the mainstream route.