Exploring Community, Legal, and Cultural Reactions to Victimization

The report’s central theme is “Victims and Victimology,” which would begin with a discussion of the social, legal, and political reactions to social injury. Particularly, people who are afraid of crime are the best victims. Social groupings would become marginalized because of victimization experiences. One way to conceptualize victimology is as the development of science combined with criminology. Some of the serious experiences that the marginalized social groups have had have resulted in their victimization. Lastly, it would concentrate on the construction of a victim’s image that has been placed at flexible levels.

Critically examine institutional, social, legal, and public reactions to victimization

Victims are acknowledged as individuals who have typically experienced the hurt inflicted by others in the community. They are several forms of pain that are related to the same thing. These include, among many other things, loss of financial obligations, physical harm, and emotional distress (Braun, 2019). Crimes can be committed in a variety of ways, including legal, social, and political ones. Victims who have been weak, reliant, and exposed require ongoing assurance from a variety of sources. Serious human rights breaches are committed alongside crimes against the state or government.

The victims of crime and social harm can also receive assistance through a variety of techniques. According to Braun (2019), some crimes, like treason and espionage, are committed because of unjust attempts by the state or administration. Additionally, it would discourage the offenders from engaging in political activities, such as casting ballots or participating in elections. However, the nation’s political structures could do everything in their power to support the victims in their fight against the changes.

There are cases where victims experience social repercussions because they may experience severe trauma, anxiety, and depression that prevents them from overcoming their circumstances. Furthermore, they could struggle to uphold and control their social roles, which include bonding with others, parenting, and socializing. People who have survived severe cases of rape, domestic abuse, and molestation, for instance, may take their time enjoying and even embracing a healthy atmosphere.

According to Walklate et al. (2019), victims may also have to wait a long time for justice, which could cause them to swiftly lose faith in the legal system. However, it is also noted that wealthy and influential offenders may receive assistance from legal channels, putting victims in similar or worse situations. That isn’t always the case, though, since victims’ rights have occasionally also been upheld.

Some of the key components related to victims’ rights are included in the UN Declaration (Walklate et al. 2019). Among them are restitution, rehabilitation, recompense, and other people’s just treatment. By allowing them to have efficient legal procedures, they should be able to preserve the victims’ safety and privacy.

Examine how intersections of social identity shape victimisation experiences

Due to several significant issues, including political, economic, social, psychological, and others, social groups have been marginalized. Varona (2020) asserts that based on their experiences with crimes, they have been victims for a variety of reasons. Discrimination based on race, religion, sex, creed, place of birth, physical appearance, and many other factors is the primary source of victimization for marginalized social groups.

The society has evolved and has tried to establish certain kinds of circumstances for those around them to be able to effectively participate in the market, these standards are becoming more and more prevalent every day (Varona, 2020). Many academics think that the diversity of languages and cultures has either begun to homogenize or is being ignored in the age of capitalization and rapidly growing globalization.

According to Long (2021), due to their shared identities, ideal victims are only exemplified through social frameworks. Economic theories, political theories, sociological theories, social learning theories, control theories, and many more are all related to the criminology characteristics of victims. However, they have become victims of business activities due to the significant rise in a variety of talents, including vocational training. It demonstrates how those people would continue the issues in a way that would involve other people and organizations, including the police, the media, and some criminal justice organizations.

For example, victims have experienced disproportionate degrees of social exclusion and humiliation, particularly those who have been subjected to disparaging remarks based on the colour of their skin. Furthermore, two strategies that could be applied to these modifications are as follows. One of these is that generalized stated stereotypes and prejudices cause economic suffering for socially marginalized groups (Chopin and Beauregard, 2023). Nonetheless, it is well recognized that those who are not financially solid are more likely to find themselves in precarious situations.

Examine how the social construction of victim status shifts across contexts

In ways that are typically regarded as flexible, victims have been socially manufactured. The way that victims have been perpetuated has gone too far in neglecting neglected individuals based on their sex, religion, creed, and other characteristics. In most cases, these victims have been shown in a manner that has been recognized as the victimization process. According to Chopin and Beauregard (2023), hypervigilance and hyperactivity are the two main ways that the social construct of victimization has been constructed, and both can result in a significant internalization of behavioural symptoms.

According to Settles et al. (2020), there are certain notable statistics that demonstrate the close relationship between victims and crime. For example, there have been ideas that when a victim is a minor, meaning they are under the age of 18, their suffering is sometimes valued appropriately; otherwise, their issues are not given any attention. It seems sense that a woman might be viewed as a criminal rather than a victim if she engages in prostitution as an adult. The way society views the victim and their plans for action, however, will determine this.

Social norms have been trying to classify some of the primary differences in victims’ views. According to Jussila et al. (2019), some of them have a small amount of guilt, while others have a lot of guilt some even belong to the criminal. It has been observed that society frequently creates such negative perceptions of the victims that they often feel isolated and believe they are the only cause of the situations.

It has been discovered that victims withdraw their cases when they are severely questioned and doubted. It is also well known that some of them do not even bother to register a complaint against the offender. The precipitation hypothesis of victims, which holds that the victims caused the crime, is much in line with these. Most of the time, widespread disarray in social forums has led to an increase in the severity of crimes.

According to Settles et al. (2020), the theory of deviant places has proposed that one of the key causes of victimization and social disarray is population density. Due to significant crime regions that are incorporated due to a breakdown in parental authority and high levels of criminal activity due to large populations and extreme poverty, the rate of these types of crimes increases exponentially (Jussila et al. 2019). Although these places have forced people to commit crimes, some psychologists also acknowledge that some offenders are victims of their upbringing (Settles et al. 2020). The example of a robber who dislikes stealing but is driven to do so by hunger could help illustrate this point. As a result, society would undoubtedly be crucial in shaping a victim’s perception.

Conclusion

One could draw the conclusion that the victims are the ones who have benefited from every law in any area of their lives, whether it be financially, emotionally, or mentally. Victory ought to be cognizant of its legal, social, and political implications. However, occasionally it is also noted that this viewpoint is so strong that they harm others or commit crimes themselves. Religion, creed, sex, location of origin, color, and many other factors have all contributed to the marginalization of social groupings. It has been demonstrated that their position will decline in line with the continuation of the crimes committed against them. Lastly, it has been noted that society has a malevolent conception of victims that, occasionally, makes them feel more guilty than the offenders.

References

Braun, K., (2019). Victim participation rights: Variation across criminal justice systems. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan.

Chopin, J. and Beauregard, E., (2023). Understanding the Sexual Victimization of Child and Elder Victims under the Lens of Interactional Victimology: A Routine Activities Theory Approach.Justice Quarterly, pp.1-23.

Jussila, H., Leimgruber, W. and Majoral, R. eds., (2019).Perceptions of marginality: Theoretical issues and regional perceptions of marginality in geographical space. Routledge.

Long, L.J., (2021). The ideal victim: A critical race theory (CRT) approach.International Review of Victimology,27(3), pp.344-362.

Settles, I.H., Warner, L.R., Buchanan, N.T. and Jones, M.K., (2020). Understanding psychology’s resistance to intersectionality theory using a framework of epistemic exclusion and invisibility.Journal of Social Issues,76(4), pp.796-813.

Varona, G., (2020). The relevance of error margins in the trend towards algorithmic victimology: some remarks on the futures of theory and risk assessment from the Spanish periphery.An international perspective on contemporary developments in Victimology: A Festschrift in Honor of Marc Groenhuijsen, pp.31-44.

Walklate, S., Maher, J., McCulloch, J., Fitz-Gibbon, K. and Beavis, K., (2019). Victim stories and victim policy: Is there a case for a narrative victimology?. Crime, media, culture, 15(2), pp.199-215.