Do Now

1. Do Now Is there such a thing as a victimless crime?

2. What is Deviance? • Deviance is any behavior that violates social norms, and is usually of sufficient severity to warrant disapproval from the majority of society. • Deviance can be criminal or non-criminal.

3. What is Deviance? Deviance: deviating from the norm Deviance is relative to time and place because what is considered deviant in one social context may be non-deviant in another (e.g., fighting during a hockey game vs. fighting in a nursing home). Killing another human is considered wrong except when governments permit it during warfare or self-defense. 

4. Criminal and Non-Criminal Deviance • The sociological discipline that deals with crime (behavior that violates laws) is criminology (also known as criminal justice). • Americans consider such activities as alcoholism, excessive gambling, being nude in public places, playing with fire, stealing, lying, refusing to bathe, purchasing the services of prostitutes, and cross-dressing—to name only a few—as deviant.

5. Deviance Challenge If you would like extra credit….are you willing to take the deviance challenge? Try the suggested activity and write down what you did and what happened afterward and hand into the Box of Deviance

6. Deviance is relative to place

7. Differential Association Theory • How people learn deviance. • According to this theory, the environment plays a major role in deciding which norms people learn to violate. • People also learn their norms from various socializing agents—parents, teachers, ministers, family, friends, co-workers, and the media. • Example: Gangs glorify violence, retaliation, and crime as means to achieving social status.

8. Anomie Theory • Anomie refers to the confusion that arises when social norms conflict or don't even exist • Example: The differences between socially accepted goals and the availability of means to achieve those goals. • Attaining wealth is a major goal of Americans, but not all Americans possess the means to do this. • Those who find the “road to riches” closed to them experience anomie, because an obstacle has stopped their pursuit of a socially approved goal. • When this happens, these individuals may employ deviant behaviors to attain their goals, retaliate against society, or merely “make a point.”

9. Control Theory • People have various restraints: internal controls, such as conscience, values, integrity, morality, and the desire to be a “good person”. • They have outer controls, such as police, family, friends, and religious authorities. • Sanctions - consequences

10. Labeling Theory • Concerns the meanings people derive from one another's labels • Conforming members of society, who interpret certain behaviors as deviant and then attach this label to individuals • Labeled persons may include drug addicts, alcoholics, criminals, delinquents, prostitutes, sex offenders, disabled people, and psychiatric patients, to mention a few.

11. What did we learn? • Deviance is Deviating from the norm, breaking social rules • Differential Association Theory: -states that people learn deviance from others • Anomie Theory is -there are no norms…or powerless to adhere to them • Control Theory is: People listen to external rules and internal rules to be a “good person”. • Labeling Theory is Giving groups that we think are deviant; categories.

12. How Safe is your Community? • http://www.neighborhoodscout.com/ny/crime/

13. Do Now: Why is there Crime? There are many sociological theories about why there is crime.

14. Yochelson and Samenow put forward the theory of free will to explain criminal behavior. This has five points to it: 1. The roots of criminality lie in the way people think and make their decisions. 2. Criminals think and act differently than other people, even from a very young age. 3. Criminals are, by nature, irresponsible, impulsive, self-centered, and driven by fear and anger. 4. Deterministic explanations of crime result from believing the criminal who is seeking sympathy. 5. Crime occurs because the criminal wills it or chooses it, and it is this choice they make that rehabilitation must deal with.

16. Robert Merton’s Theory of Crime Five modes of adaptation • Conformity • Innovation • Retreatism • Ritualism • Rebellion

17. There is no single factor that predisposes a person to behave violently or become involved in criminal behavior. Individual, community and societal level factors, and interactions among these factors, all influence behavior. Some increase the risk of becoming involved in criminal offending and some can help buffer the effects of risk factors and are known as protective factors. Persons take decisions to stay away from crime despite the predisposing factors or to engage in crime without any risk factors that create a predisposition. In the US Surgeon General's Report on Youth Crime, a risk factor is defined as anything that increases the probability that a person will suffer harm ( US Surgeon General 2001). A protective factor is something that decreases the potential harmful effect of a risk factor. Protective factors help mediate the effects of risk factors to reduce their influence. For example, socio-economic disadvantage is often seen as a risk factor for delinquency but the effects of low income and other types of disadvantage can be offset by the presence of nurturing parents and a cohesive neighborhood(Sampson et al. 1997). Social cohesion helps lower crime rates even in low income neighborhoods. The presence of several risk factors has a multiplying effect. In other words, the presence of a single risk factor raises the risk of offending, and two or three risk factors raises the risk even more. Individuals interact with their environment and if both individual-level and community-level risk factors are present, the chances of offending are higher than if just one were present. Risk factors are not causes of crime and their presence does not guarantee that a person will participate in crime. Many children and adolescents living in what might be considered high risk families or neighborhoods do not become delinquent due to protective factors that buffer the effects of risk factors. In addition, risk factors are not static and can change depending on when they occur in a young person's development, in what social context, and under what circumstances.

18. What is Crime? • Any discussion of deviance remains incomplete without a discussion of crime, which is any act that violates written criminal law. • Society sees most crimes, such as robbery, assault, battery, rape, murder, burglary, as deviant. • But some crimes, such as those committed in violation of laws against selling merchandise on Sundays, are not really deviant.

19. Types of Crimes • The types of crimes committed are as varied as the types of criminals who commit them. Most crimes fall into one of two categories— crimes against people or crimes against property.

20. Crimes Against Property • Of the almost 1.5 million Americans under some form of correctional supervision, most are there for offenses against someone else's property. • In other words, property crimes are much more common than those against persons are. • Property crimes take place on average once every 2 to 3 seconds in the United States. • Every year about one in 20 Americans falls victim to a property crime.

22. Crimes against People • The category of crimes against people includes such crimes as murder, rape, assault, child abuse, and sexual harassment. • Violent crimes take place on average once every 20 to 30 seconds in the United States. • Thus, the chances of being the victim of some form of violent crime in this country are disturbingly high.

28. Crime Rates • Top 10 Countries with lowest crime rates • Top 10 Cities in the U.S. with highest crime rates • Crime Tour

29. What is White Collar Crime? • White-collar crime, committed by high-status individuals during the course of business, • Typical white-collar crimes include embezzlement, bribery, insurance fraud, tax fraud, Medicare theft, etc. • Bernie Madoff: financial advisor that committed what is considered to be the largest financial fraud in U.S. history

30. Computer Crime • An emerging type of crime involves using computers to “hack” (break into) military, educational, medical, and business computers.

31. Organized Crime • Organized crime refers to groups and organizations dedicated solely to criminal activity. Historically, leaders of organized crime, or “crime families” Organized crime activities are of three basic types: • Legal activities and businesses, such as restaurants. • Illegal activities, such as importing and selling narcotics, gambling, and running prostitution rings. • Extortion of funds for purposes of “protection.”

32. What did we learn? • What is crime • An act that violates a written law • What is a non-deviant crime? • Example: laws about not selling alcohol on Sundays, etc. • What two categories of crimes are there? • Crimes against people, against property • What are victimless crimes? • Crimes where there is no real person having their rights violated.