And of course none of these are good escape routes from poverty and we all believe in the term "poverty causes crime". But it’s not always the poor who commits crime. Mostly the poor or the middle class people will go after crimes to fulfill their temporary desires. For example raping, stealing and sometimes murder too. Since the low class poor people are not usually educated, they often easily “pushed” into the crimes by the high class people.
Using material from item A and elsewhere assess the usefulness of sub-cultural theories in explaining sub-cultural crime and deviance in society today. Subcultures, such as the ones mentioned in item A consist of a group of people whom share the same norms and values together, yet oppose mainstream culture. Criminals are seen to become part of a subculture as their values are different to normal society. These criminal individuals have rejected society’s norms and invented their own as they feel that society has rejected them, which means they become materially deprived and blame society as it has not met their needs. However, the criminals resort to things such as burglary to maintain materialistic property.
I have concluded that substance abuse is a huge contributor to crimes being committed. The lack or decrease in moral intuition and character can cause a person to make bad decisions. This would cause people not to understand the benefits of to abiding to common social values. A person demographics can also play a role in determining whether or not an individual will turn to a life of crime. Government officials, politicians, and courts employees have concluded that individuals commit crimes for private alternatives and they should be punished and held responsible for their actions and conduct.
For example the majority of this criminal subculture will feel materially deprived, which they will blame of society not meeting their needs. They will then resort to crime in order to obtain this materialism. There is also many other cultures within this main sub culture, for example drug takers or hippies. These sub cultures offer a sense of ID to the individual and allows them to integrate into their new society which they may not have otherwise been able to do into main society. However, subcultures alone cannot explain the trend in crime and deviance there are many other factors contributing such as the individual.
Conclusion: Poverty Does Not Fosters Crime Many people believe that poverty is the main cause of crimes in a city or country. They believe that the only thing poor people do is steal, mug, or even assassin to get things instead of working like a normal people do. For example, I have seen very rich people claiming that poor people are a problem to society because they do not give anything good to it; how poor people are thrown away from certain places only because they “scare normal people”, now society excludes them because of fear. We have become so judgmental that when we see a black guy or some other man with not so good clothes or with a not so good appearance (or in any way that poor people look) walking down the street coming right at us, we immediately though that he is going to assault us and maybe kill us; but if we see a man in a business suit, well shaved, with a clean hair cut, and a nice smile we might think it is even a friends of ours that is coming to say hi. There is something society should know, the rate of crimes is increasing in wealthy countries; the man in the suit could have done a scam or he might me a hit man.
In our society it is assumed we are all treated equally, but in fact many times this is not true. Minority individuals have a disadvantage in the criminal justice system because of the lack of money, and effective resources. This is very damaging to society and may be a root cause for so many disparity issues today. Factors of Racial Disparity Society cannot be run for the privileged and allow a substantial proportion of the population to be an allowance beyond what is needed. This impacts the quality of life for all of us if we have to “throw away people.”A justice system that tolerates injustice is doomed to collapse (The Sentencing Project, 2000).
There is also evidenced failure in the government’s efforts in enforcing safety standards. This is one example indicating the constraints of the law in its timely and effective response to serious safety hazards in the workplace for the less fortunate in society (Reiman, 1979). Although these issues are evidenced in every life, they are rarely responded since attaining the results through the set out legal system requires professionalism, skills, resources and influencing in the effort of identifying a loop-hole in the system and in the process oppress the poor even more. Since poor people cannot access any of the above, they often get to suffer for crimes they did not commit. The article further alludes to racial prejudices in the judiciary system citing
Prejudice can be defined as “a negative attitude toward and entire category of people, often an ethnic or racial minority group”, and this film portrays this very well. The wealthy were prejudiced toward the poor, “slumdogs” and set standards for the poor people. The “slumdogs” had no say in their lives because the wealthy have already decided what they are capable of without giving them many chances. Prejudice from the wealthy is shown clearly in the opinion that someone from the slum could not possibly possess knowledge. The quizmaster – who himself has gone from rags to riches - presents this belief to the audience, and their response shows them to be in agreement with it.
However, even in a functionalist society, too much crime can be bad for the group, causing it to lose the standard harmony and eventually causing the society to collapse. Where functionalists see stability and consensus, conflict theorist
Such as Traditional Marxists, who focus on corporate crimes but it neglects the working class crime and its effect. Neo Marxists are criticised for romanticising working class criminals, and left realists point out that working class criminals most victimise other Woking class people not the rich. Labelling theorists see working class criminals as the victims of the discriminatory labelling by social control agents. Left realists argue that this approach neglects the real victims- working class people who suffer at the hands of the criminals. Young argues that this has led to ‘aetiological crisis’ a crisis in explanation as there has been a real increase in crime since the 1950s.