Another reason why they are in agreement with this statement is that people from lower social class backgrounds are significantly more likely to appear in conviction statistics than people from wealthier backgrounds and it is a matter of argument as to whether they commit more crime, or they are more likely to be convicted if they do commit crimes. Most working class people are brought up with minimal morals, values or expectations to grow up with so they are very likely to put time and effort into other areas, such as social popularity through gangs and crime. This is further proved as people that live in working class subcultures are more like to commit crimes under the influence of peers, e.g. due to peer pressure.
A further reason as to why sociologists believe this statement is true is that more men are stereotyped as criminal than women because women are expected and most likely to be at home with demands of housework and parenting, meaning that they would have minimal time to plot and commit crimes. They have more responsibilities than men, resulting not being perceived as those that commit crime, or criminals.
However some sociologists disagree with this statement could be that the actual statistics themselves are biased as the police only target certain groups or class of people they assume are most likely to commit crime, resulting in statistics showing invalid data. This suggests that the statistics provided by the police are notoriously unreliable and should be treated with caution. For instance, there is a lot of dark hidden crime that goes unnoticed and undetected.
Another reason why other sociologists disagree with this statement as they believe that one major reason why mostly young working class men are convicted is due to social class stereotyping. The officials, such as the police, spend more time around working class areas assuming they are the initial threat to society, meaning less time and effort is spent around middle class people as they are least expected to commit crimes and are more likely to escape various criminal offences. A Marxist view crime in terms of social structure sparking from social conflict which to them is an inevitable result of capitalism, which produces a society in which people live in poverty, as an outcome, they turn to crime. Marxists view that in society; middle class people commit white collar crime, such as fraud, and tend to escape any harsh punishments.
A further reason why other sociologists disagree with this statement is due to the chivalry thesis, which stresses the idea that men are perceived as more of a ‘serious threat’ to society and need to be watched more, while women are treated more leniently and are usually let off with a warning for minor offences. A feminist view upon this may be that women are treated with less equality to men as the police assume they have more responsibilities at home.
In conclusion, some sociologists believe that young working class men are more likely to commit crime than any other sections of age, class or gender because of various factors such as lack of responsibilities, demands of parenting and housework of women and the lower values of working class. Whereas others disagree and believe that anyone can commit crime, for example middle classed people are more likely to commit white collar crime, the chivalry thesis which leads to biased behaviour towards different genders and the idea that if policing is biased then statistics are very likely to be biased.
