SOC 1500 Lecture Notes - Abortion Clinic, Victimless Crime, Gateway Drug Theory

• School: University of Guelph
• Department: Sociology
• Course: SOC 1500
• Professor: Mavis Morton

Document Summary

Crimes that essentially have no victim; they are behaviours that society has criminalized because they contract values, norms, and customs. This chapter is divided into four main sections: law and morality, illegal sexuality, drugs and alcohol abuse, emerging issues. For example: both parties are usually willing/consenting participants in the transaction, therefore, there is no victim. In some cases, the prostitute is raped or forced, but this differs with each case. Sir patrick devlin: without shared ideas on politics, morals and ethics no society can exist he is saying that we must have standards of morality to keep society in order. Gusfield: outlawing certain acts gives moral superiority to people who follow moral standards and degrades groups of people to commit acts that conflict moral standards. Some immoral acts can actually prevent criminal acts: people who watch porn can release sexual tension that otherwise may have resulted in crime.