Help them realise
HELP THEM REALISE THEIR POTENTIAL: A LOOK AT THE INCREASING PUNITIVENESS OF SENTENCING CHILDREN AND ITS SOCIOLOGICAL UNDERPINNINGS ESTELA STEVENS AND JORDAN PAIVA
Society places great faith in the potential of
stir up public sentiment around youth crime. This
children, however, this faith can prove fickle
persuasion can be damaging to public perception
when it encounters an interaction with the justice
of young offenders as the media often reports
system. Public response often transitions from
on
nurturing to hostile when children receive welfare
encouraging simplified rhetoric, rather than a more
modeled consequences rather than solely punitive
balanced view of young offenders. The general public
penalties. Expectation for tougher punishments
doesn’t have access to the in-depth knowledge
for children in the justice system is not new,
of the justice system needed to understand the
however, it is misinformed as recidivism may be
nuance of juvenile crime, and without it, it is easy
increased by such punitive measures. Magnifying
to rely on a rudimentary and incomplete attitude
retributive reaction does not aid the community
towards sentencing. Society’s perceived feeling of
nor the offender, however rehabilitative sentencing
safety is primarily shaped by their perception of
options may be beneficial to both. This paper
social disorder, and then secondarily by reported
seeks to uncover why the public seeks increasingly
levels of anxiety. Politicians and media outlets
‘tough on youth crime’ rhetoric through the lens
frequently
of three arguments; sociological understandings of
which may have an adverse effect on the public’s
political and media advocacy for harsher juvenile
impression of community safety. When the media
sentencing, effects of harsher sentencing on the
encourages politicians’ ‘tough on crime’ rhetoric
community, and why the justice system should
by reporting on heinous criminal offenses, it may
distance itself from such harsh attitudes towards
increase feelings of social disorder. As a result,
rehabilitation.
politicians will often take advantage of this for
emotionally
adopt
charged
‘tough
and
on
violent
crime’
stories,
discourse,
their own gain by using it for their own purposes, The media and politicians work hand in hand to
such as employing this language to garner votes for
