A Block Criminology - To start today, you will need to set up a blog for the course. You may use Canva, Sway (through your school district office 365 account), Google's Blogspot, Wordpress, Live Journal, or any other blog creation site you choose (like Wix) . I would HIGHLY recommend staying with Wordpress, Live Journal or Blogger (Blogger is a Google product so it makes sense to use your G-mail account, if you have one, to create a Blogger site). Here are a few previous examples from past Criminology family members: Criminology (Jacob on Wordpress); Crime Journal (Darion on Live Journal); Criminology 12 (Madison on Blogger)
After you create your blog (IF YOU GET STUCK on the blog creation portion, then move on and in a Google Doc or Word file), then as your first entry you'll need to write your own theory as to why people commit crime. To help, use the brainstormed list we did in class last week along with the theories handout you'll get today and the notes below... To help you build your own theories about why crime happens - which is your first blog entry - below you'll find some notes on Choice, Trait, Social Structure, Social Learning, and Conflict theories:
Choice Theory (Chapter 4 in the Crim textbook) Choice theories assume that criminals carefully choose whether to commit criminal acts. People are influenced by their fear of the criminal penalties associated with being caught and convicted for law violations. The choice approach is rooted in the classical criminology of Cesare Beccaria, who argued that punishment should be certain, swift, and severe enough to deter crime. Today, choice theorists view crime as offense- and offender-specific. Offense-specific means that the characteristics of the crime control whether it occurs. For example, carefully protecting a home makes it less likely to be a target of crime. Offender-specific refers to the personal characteristics of potential criminals. People with specific skills and needs may be more likely to commit crime than others. Research shows that offenders consider their targets carefully before deciding on a course of action. Even violent criminals and drug addicts show signs of rationality.
Trait Theory (Chapter 5 in the Crim textbook) One area of interest is biochemical factors, such as diet, allergies, hormonal imbalances, and environmental contaminants (such as lead). The conclusion is that crime, especially violence, is a function of diet, vitamin intake, hormonal imbalance, or food allergies. Neurophysiological factors, such as brain disorders, ADHD, EEG abnormalities, tumors, and head injuries have been linked to crime. Criminals and delinquents often suffer brain impairment, as measured by the EEG. Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and minimal brain dysfunction are related to antisocial behavior. An evolutionary branch holds that changes in the human condition, which have taken millions of years to evolve, may help explain crime rate differences. As the human race evolved, traits and characteristics have become ingrained. Cognitive psychology is concerned with human development and how people perceive the world. Criminality is viewed as a function of improper information processing. Individual reasoning processes influence behavior. Reasoning is influenced by the way people perceive their environment. Psychological traits such as personality and intelligence have been linked to criminality. One important area of study has been the antisocial personality, a person who lacks emotion and concern for others.
Social Structure Theories (Chapter 6 in the Crim textbook) Social structure theories suggest that people’s place in the socioeconomic structure influences their chances of becoming criminals. Poor people are more likely to commit crimes because they are unable to achieve monetary or social success in any other way. Social structure theory includes three schools of thought: social disorganization, strain, and cultural deviance theories. Social disorganization theory suggests that the urban poor violate the law because they live in areas in which social control has broken down. Strain theories view crime as resulting from the anger people experience over their inability to achieve legitimate social and economic success. Cultural deviance theories hold that a unique value system develops in lower-class areas. Lower-class values approve of behaviors such as being tough, never showing fear, and defying authority. People perceiving strain will bond together in their own groups or subcultures for support and recognition.
Social Process Theories (Chapter 7 in the Crim textbook) Social learning theory stresses that people learn how to commit crimes. Social control theory analyzes the failure of society to control criminal tendencies. Labeling theory maintains that negative labels produce criminal careers. Social learning theory suggests that people learn criminal behaviors much as they learn conventional behavior. Control theory maintains that all people have the potential to become criminals, but their bonds to conventional society prevent them from violating the law. This view suggests that a person’s self-concept aids his or her commitment to conventional action. Social reaction or labeling theory holds that criminality is promoted by becoming negatively labeled by significant others. Such labels as “criminal,” “ex-con,” and “junkie” isolate people from society and lock them into lives of crime.
Conflict Theory (Chapter 8 in the Crim textbook) Social conflict theorists view crime as a function of the conflict that exists in society. Conflict theorists suggest that crime in any society is caused by class conflict. Laws are created by those in power to protect their rights and interests. Marxist criminology views the competitive nature of the capitalist system as a major cause of crime. The poor commit crimes because of their frustration, anger, and need. The wealthy engage in illegal acts because they are used to competition and because they must do so to keep their positions in society.
Once you've done this, then find an article about a recent crime here in Canada, make a link to the news article on your blogsite and then write how your crime theory explains why the crime happened. An excellent crime news website is the CANOE CNews Crime site...or the Toronto Star Crime site...or Global News Crime site...or the Huffington Post Canada Crime site...or the Vancouver Sun Crime Blog
And to help you here is an example from a previous Criminology family member Mariah Barth...
Crime happens for many reasons, however I believe that one of the main reasons people commit crime is because of social structures they are immersed in and the people they associate with. Obviously there are many other contributing factors such as brain chemistry, gender, drug usage, inner conflict and just plain choice, the list could go on and on, but the people we surround ourselves with play a huge role in how we behave. I know personally I act differently around my parents then I do when its just my friends and I. others play a huge influence in our lives. As children we learned everything from our parents and mimicked their behavior, then as we entered school we made friends and copied their behavior as well. If we ended up making friends with bad apples then we will most likely be doing and acting the way they are, all feeding off each others behavior in a sense Peer pressure from these same people we hang around with has a major influence on whether or not we are committing crime. For example in this article you have a 13 year old boy planning on robbing a convince store with no previous criminal record and 3 accomplices older then him, I don't personally know the kid but something tells me he was not the one to come up with the idea, maybe robbing the store what he had to do to become a member of the "Indian Posse" gang or just to impress the older boys either way it was most likely him trying to be tough and to impress someone else. I personally know a kid who at the age of 15 tried to shoplift something from a mall, I don't know what it was he was trying to steal but what I do know was he got chased and tackled by mall cops then spent a few hours in jail waiting for his mother to bail him out. This kid is not a bad kid I know that he is a good human being, comes from a good stable he's just your average teenage boy trying to fit in, but the kids he was hanging around with are kind of shady guys, I know for a fact that this boy regrets doing this, and in the long run getting caught for him turned out being more embarrassing then being too chicken to shoplift whatever it was he was attempting to steal. It just goes to show how far people will go to feel some sort of belonging in society and when they themselves feel uncomfortable with the fact that they might be different in someway or defy social norms people can go to extreme lengths to feel loved and important.
I will need your blog/web addresses next Monday, when this entry is due.
B Block Legal Studies - Today we'll start with time to finish up any work on the JTI Macdonald (tobacco advertising) case... For help with Canada (Attorney General) v. JTI Macdonald Corp., (2007) check out:Canadian Out of Home Marketing & Measurement Bureau Tobacco Guidelines
Canadian Encyclopedia Tobacco Advertising Ban Unconstitutional
The Atlantic Does Cigarette Marketing Count as Free Speech?
Tobacco control laws Canada
Yes Victoria, there is a limit to free speech
No logos: Tobacco firms under tight timeline to adopt plain packaging
Plain cigarette packs to hit shelves as 'best in the world' regulations kick in
Global News Cigarette packs to be stripped of logos, designs as new regulations kick in
Health Canada Tobacco Products Appearance, Packaging and Labelling Regulations
Tobacco Labelling Resource Center
CBC News Parliament passes plain tobacco packaging law, regulates vaping
Now, tobacco companies argue that plain packaging is unconstitutional because it involves governments taking property from businesses – in this case, tobacco company trademarks and other intellectual property – without paying for it. Their argument is that their trademarked imagery on packages is an important promotional tool among tobacco companies, especially as their advertising options became increasingly limited. To them, Trademarks are covered under Charter section 2.b (advertising is expression). From the article in the Toronto Star When it comes to cigarettes, what’s in a package? Not much, if they’re sold in Canada, by Timothy Dewhirst
Marketing planning documents from the tobacco industry, made public through litigation, reveal the package’s role in attracting attention and communicating brand imagery. Some cigarette packages were developed with “design personalities” described as youthful, vibrant and sporty, while others were patriotic, modern, stylish or representative of success.
To offer health reassurances, brand variants presenting comparatively lower tar yields — once misleadingly marketed as “light” or “mild” — featured packages with paler tones and enhanced use of white space.
Packaging design studies, commissioned by tobacco companies, explored ways of drawing attention away from the mandated health warnings.
Tobacco companies also began offering cigarettes in alternative shapes and structural package formats, including those classified as beveled edge and “perfume” packages. Such alternative formats prompted the reworking of mandated health warnings, which undermined their effectiveness.
The physical dimensions of cigarette packages communicate brand imagery too. Packages with beveled edges associate brands with prestige and classiness. Wide packages convey masculinity, whereas those offered in slimmer packs highlight femininity.
So, package image and design was a way to make a brand unique and this is a trademarked image to the tobacco company.
For the remainder of the class we'll go through sections 3-5 (Democtratic) and 6 (Mobility) and 7 - 14 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms (legal rights section). We'll look at two cases: Rodriguez v British Columbia (Attorney General), 1993 - which deals with Section 7 of the Charter (life, liberty and security of the person) and R. v. Tessling, 2004 - which deals with Section 8 of the Charter (search and seizure).
For more information on the fight in Canada for the right to die on one's own terms look at the CBC In Depth site on the Sue Rodriguez case. In 2011, Gloria Taylor from Kelowna filed a case in B.C. Supreme Court to grant her the right to a doctor-assisted suicide. More info on this case can be found here.
In February 2015, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled in Carter v. Canada that parts of the Criminal Code would need to change to satisfy the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The parts that prohibited medical assistance in dying would no longer be valid. So in June 2016, the Parliament of Canada passed federal legislation that allows eligible Canadian adults to request medical assistance in dying. HOWEVER a Quebec court ruling struck down the existing legislation on medically assisted death on the grounds that it was too restrictive. The court gave the government until Dec. 18 (2020) to implement a new regime. Bill C-7, expands the categories of those eligible for the procedure, opening it up to people whose deaths aren't reasonably foreseeable, but imposes strict guidelines for people seeking assisted death as part of that category, including a 90-day waiting period. On March 17, 2021, the Government of Canada announced that changes to Canada’s medical assistance in dying (MAID) law are officially in force. The new law includes changes to eligibility, procedural safeguards, and the framework for the federal government’s data collection and reporting regime.
From the government of Canada's site on the newly revised MAID law...
Section 7 protects the rights to life, liberty and security of the person and prohibits government interference with these interests unless done in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice. These include the principles against arbitrariness, overbreadth and gross disproportionality. An arbitrary law is one that impacts section 7 rights in a way that is not rationally connected to the law’s purpose. An overbroad law is one that impacts section 7 rights in a way that, while generally rational, goes too far by capturing some conduct that bears no relation to the law’s purpose. A grossly disproportionate law is one whose effects on section 7 rights are so severe as to be “completely out of sync” with the law’s purpose.Section 15(1) of the Charter protects equality rights. It provides that every individual is equal before and under the law and has the right to the equal protection and equal benefit of the law without discrimination, including on the basis of mental or physical disability.
In Carter v. Canada (2015), the Supreme Court of Canada held that a competent adult’s response to a grievous and irremediable medical condition is a matter critical to their dignity and autonomy. A criminal prohibition on MAID for a person in this situation – whom the law would permit to request palliative sedation, refuse artificial nutrition and hydration or request the removal of life-sustaining medical equipment – impacts liberty and security of the person. This is because the criminal prohibition interferes with the ability to make decisions concerning bodily integrity and leads to serious suffering. Broadening the law to permit MAID for persons whose natural death is not reasonably foreseeable would promote the liberty and security of the person interests of individuals who seek MAID as a response to a grievous and irremediable illness.
C Block Human Geography - Today we'll start with time to work on your definitions for Hearth and Diffusion and work on your Comox Valley Fast Food map and big thinking question...
What pattern exists and why are the fast food restaurants located in that pattern (give at least three reasons – use the concepts of site, situation, and region in your response along with density, distribution, and concentration)
If there's time we'll look at the Key Question: Why Are Some Human Actions Not Sustainable? We'll look at what a resource is (renewable and non-renewable) along with the uses and misuses of resources by humans.
And remember the vids I posted on the blog Friday...they can help too
For the last question about heartland and hinterland check out the following links on core and periphery (same concept) at:
Today's Fit...
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