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  3. (1)Criminology has treated women’s role in crime with a large measure of indifference. The intellectual tradition from which cri

(1)Criminology has treated women’s role in crime with a large measure of indifference. The intellectual tradition from which cri

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问题     (1)Criminology has treated women’s role in crime with a large measure of indifference. The intellectual tradition from which criminology derives its conception of these sexes maintains esteem for men’s autonomy, intelligence and force of character while disdaining women for their weaknesses of compliance and passivity. Women who conform as pure, obedient daughters, wives and mothers benefit men and society.
    Those women who don’t, that is are non-conforming, may simply be one who questions established beliefs or practices, or one who engages in activities associated with men, or one who commits a crime. These women are doubly damned and doubly deviant. They are seen as "mad" not "bad". These behaviors frequently lead to interpretations of being mentally abnormal and unstable. Those doing the defining, by the very act, are never defined as "other", but are the norm. As "men" are the norm, women are deviant. Women are defined in reference to men. In the words of Young, "sexual difference is one of the ways in which normal is marked out from deviant". So why do these differences exist within the criminal justice system and society as a whole? In order to understand why offending and punishment differs between genders it is important to acknowledge and analyze past perceptions, theories and perspectives from predominant sociologists and criminologists of that time towards women in society.
    (2)Up until the turn of the century, women were primarily perceived as sexual objects and expected to remain within male dominated ideologies such as homemaker, career and nurturer taking second place after men. Women who strayed from the norm were severely punished, void of any opportunities to explain their actions. Perhaps interventions from Elizabeth Fry in the early nineteenth century campaigning for women to be housed in separate prisons from men and offered rehabilitation could be marked as the starting point for intense studies being conducted into relationships between women and crime. The conception at that time was that women must be protected from, rather than held responsible for their criminal actions. Unfortunately, such intervention only caused coaxing rather than coercion, that is, women became segregated even more as individual members of their community.
    (3)Later in the late nineteenth century, Lombroso and Ferrero wrote a book called, The Female Offender. Their theories were based on "atavism". Atavism refers to the belief that all individuals displaying anti-social behavior were biological throwbacks. The born female criminal was perceived to have the criminal qualities of the male plus the worst characteristics of women. According to Lombroso and Ferrero, these included deceitful-ness, cunning and spite among others and were not apparent among males. This appeared to indicate that criminal women were genetically more male than female, therefore biologically abnormal. Criminality in men was a common feature of their natural characteristics, whereby women, their biologically-determined nature was antithetical to crime. Female social deviants or criminals who did not act according to pre-defined standards were diagnosed as pathological and requiring treatment, they were to be "cured" or "removed".
    (4)Other predominant theorists such as Thomas and later, Pollack, believed that criminality was a pathology and socially induced rather than biologically inherited. As Thomas says, "the girl as a child does not know she has any particular value until she learns it from others". Pollack believed, "it is the learned behavior from a very young age that leads girls into a ’masked’ character of female criminality", that is, how it was and still is concealed through under-reporting and low detection rates of female offenders. He further states, "in our male-dominated culture, women have always been considered strange, secretive and sometimes dangerous". A greater leniency towards women by police and the justice system needs to be addressed especially if a "true" equality of genders is to be achieved in such a complicated world.
    (5)Although it may be true that society has changed since the days of Lombroso and Ferrero, past theories appear to remain within much of today’s criminal justice system. Women have so many choices of which they didn’t before. It would appear naive to assume that women and crime may be explained by any one theory. Any crime for mat matter, whether male or female, may not be explained by any one theory. It is an established and non-arguable fact that males and females differ biologically and sociological influences, such as gender-specific role-playing appears to continue within most families. It’s a matter of proportion not difference. According to Edwards, "the enemy is within every woman, but is not her reproductive biology, rather it is the habit regarding it into which she has been led by centuries of male domination".
    (6)Many argue, the main culprit for aggression as seen in many men is "testosterone". This hormone appears responsible for much of the male crime, even in today’s society of increased knowledge on the subject. In contrast, extensive research over the past twenty-five years done on the testosterone/aggression link focusing on prenatal testosterone predisposing boys to be rougher than girls, concluded it was very difficult to show any connection between testosterone and aggressive behavior. Cross-cultural studies of ninety-five societies revealed forty-seven percent of them were free of rape while at least thirty-three societies were free of war and interpersonal violence was extremely rare. Based on these studies, it may be evident to suggest that sociological factors and environmental influences appear to have greater credibility in explaining criminal behavior, whether male or female.
    (7)As most women commit crimes of a lesser violent nature such as shop-lifting, leniency is given to them from law enforcement officers and judges. It is true that many women use their "femininity" to their advantage which makes it very difficult to argue equal rights for both sexes. This unequal position of women in society due to social oppression and economic dependency on men and me state, needs to be addressed.
What is the main idea of the first paragraph?
选项 A、The tradition thinks that men are self-controlled and clever.
B、Women who do not conform will be punished or commit a crime.
C、Defining of the norm is in reference to men’s activities.
D、Women criminals are treated with indifference before the law.
答案D
解析 本题考查段落中心思想。原文第1段重点揭露了法律漠视犯罪女性这一现象并说明追溯其根源的必要性，显然第1句是该段的主题句，所以选项D是正确答案。
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