Discuss how liberal feminism has influenced thinking about delinquency

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

• According to liberal feminists, females are less delinquent than males, because their social roles provide fewer opportunities to commit crime.
• As the roles of women become more similar to those of men, so will their crime patterns. Female criminality is motivated by the same influences as male criminality.
• According to Freda Adler by striving for independence women have begun to alter the institutions that had protected males in their traditional positions of power.
• Adler argued that female delinquency would be affected by the changing role of women. As females entered new occupations and participated in sports, politics, and other traditionally male endeavors, they would also become involved in crimes that had heretofore been male-oriented; delinquency rates would then converge. She noted that girls were becoming increasingly involved in traditionally masculine crimes such as gang activity and fighting.
• Adler predicted that the women's movement would produce steeper increases in the rate of female delinquency, because it created an environment in which the roles of girls and boys converge. She predicted that the changing female role would produce female criminals who are similar to their male counterparts.