Crime and Delinquency

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Kathryn Galbraith

November 21, 2003

"Crime and Delinquency"

Kathryn Galbraith

In the year 2003 and many previous years before, one enormous problem our society is and was plagued with is crime and delinquency. There is not an easy way to explain crime and delinquency, however there are a multitude of reasons that these offenses are committed. Attempting to understand the logic behind crime and delinquency or trying to find an explanation is a complex task. A crime is an offense committed against the law, whereas delinquency is failing to do what law or obligation requires. As you can see they go hand in hand in destroying our world when these acts are committed. There are many theories behind what causes crime; keeping in mind that a theory is not a fact, it is simply an educated opinion, on why something happens. Regardless of what those theories are, crime is still one of the biggest problems America and other countries faced in the past and will continue to face as each day passes.

Crime is committed in many ways, however the criminals and delinquents do not seem to see how their actions spiral or understand the many ways it destroys our nation, and if these criminals do understand this, they simply just do not care.

Many sociologists define this issue in a somewhat different way. Some believe deviance is any behavior that members of a social group define as violating their norms. The concept they are referring to applies not only to criminal issues, but also non-criminal and non-deviant acts. These certain acts many people would view as immoral, unethical or peculiar, which all leads to outside the respectable boundaries many faithful and lawful citizens hold. Another sociologist found another meaning for the common word delinquency. Breckenridge's definition was as...