Getting tough on
young offenders in
the media: A
research summary
and development
Based on: ‘If we are tough on
crime, if we punish crime, then
people get the message’ :
Constructing and governing the
punishable young offender in
Canada during the late 1990s,”
BRYAN R. HOGEVEEN,
Punishment and Society, 2005
• Media reports and debates
in Parliament over late
1990s construct the
category of the ‘punishable
young offender’
• This discursive category
creates ‘ethic of punishment’
• …replacing existing youth
justice legislation with a
tougher law premised on
‘accountability’
• Debate was pitted at two
levels – pervasiveness of
the serious violent offender
and valorizing victims
• The Young Offender’s Act
was replaced with the Youth
Criminal Justice Act
Abstract
• Dissemination of a ‘punishable
young offender’ evident in Canada,
late 1990s as politicians, public
debated solutions to problem of
youth crime
• “Somewhere along the way, through our
soft and fuzzy and pat them on the head
and ask them not to do it again concept,
we have lost the notion that we have to
teach our kids the difference between
right and wrong . . .. . . If we are tough on
crime, if we punish crime, then people get
the message.” (Canada, Hansard
Debates, 25 September 2000)
INTRODUCTION
•
'The action taken shall, in every
case, be that which is in the
child's own good and the best
interests of the community
require' and 'every juvenile
delinquent shall be treated, not
as a criminal, but as a
misdirected and misguided child,
and one needing aid,
encouragement, help and
assistance'
Emphasis on punishable young offender … emphasis on
politics
• Politicians, citizens
argue more punitive
response is panacea
to spiraling youth
crime rates
• Pervaded media and
thus, popular
discourse
• … not diversion,
probation, or fines, but
incarceration,
incapacitation
• Unlike the earlier
legislation, the JDA
• JDA: emphasis on the
‘reformable young offender’…
• …emphasis on science
…factors
• Omnipresence of
serious violent offender
in public discourse…
• … with widespread
condemnation
• Reena Virk, Jesse
Cadman, Garrett
Dumont and Jonathan
Wamback became
focus of demands for
more punitive
legislation
“problem-defining events”
“agenda-setting”
‘SERIOUS INROADS INTO CRIME ARE BEING MADE’:
HARSH PENALTIES, AUSTERE PUNISHMENTS, AND EXCEEDINGLY
HIGH RATES OF INCARCERATION
•
•
•
•
“the punishable young offender”:
1. harsher (longer) sentences
2. calls for harsher punishment, eg.
staff member from Syl Apps
Detention Centre stated that
institution, “‘home of some of the most
brutal, violent, young murderers and
rapists in Canada, is located in Oakville
[near Toronto], but is run like a summer
camp in Muskoka’”
• 3. incarceration rates continued to climb:
• Headline (Alberta Report) bragged “‘the tide of
violence recedes and with a tougher youth policy the
next one may be averted’”
• Contrast that to an earlier period
Modernity and the
Denominational Imperative:
The Children’s Aid Society of
Halifax, 1905-1925, Lafferty
‘TAGGED’: THE MEDIA
AND VALORIZING
VICTIMS OF YOUTH
CRIME
• “The vicious assault … took place in Oyama, a small community …
Rodney Bell was hit in the head with the blunt edge of an axe in
front of his wife and children. Eight teenagers showed up to confront
Bell at his secluded lakefront home on Friday just before midnight, a
day after he chased them when they sped through an intersection,
narrowly missing his car. Bell tried to reason with the teens, one of
them grabbed an axe from a nearby woodpile and swung it full force
at Bell’s head. The gang then fled . . . As Mr. Bell lies in hospital
clinging to life, and if he does survive the possibility of some form of
paralysis ahead of him, the greatest injustice is the last line of the
story. One teen was charged with aggravated assault and remains
in custody while the other was charged with assault and released.”
(Hansard, 15 April 1999)
• …victims stood in for general public
• “‘where does it end? Local parents and other citizens are calling for
vigilante justice. They do not trust our current system of justice, that it
lets off criminals with a slap on the wrist while the victims are left in
limbo for the rest of their lives’” (Hansard, 5.2.94)
• …in debates there is a valorization of victim’s names
• “… the names of Reena Van Kirk, Dawn Shaw, and Trygve
Magnusson represent just a few victims who died at the hands of
violent youth. Their senseless deaths demand laws from the
government that punish and deter those who commit violent acts and
provide mandatory rehabilitation programs during incarceration”
(Hansard, 21 October 1999)
• …victims also became politicians, eg. Chuck Cadman
• …family started political campaigns, eg. Joe Wambach,
when youth crime stats down, said: ‘this cowardly [federal]
government won’t do anything to stop crime so they decriminalize
certain activities to make the numbers better. It’s an unconscionable,
deliberate attempt to misrepresent the issues’
Commentary on media coverage
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Media sample
FP Infomart database
National Post, 1995-2003
“young offender”
134 results
34 selected for pilot study
12 excluded, leaving 22
•Findings …
•
Brief: Ontario: Teen convicted
of animal cruelty after
barbecuing dog
ETOBICOKE - A 17-year-old girl
was convicted this week of
animal cruelty after she beat
and then barbecued her family's
Pomeranian. The 12-year-old
dog, named Peppy, had been a
family pet for the past seven
years. The young offender
could face up to six months in
jail, but the horrific case has
renewed calls for stiffer
penalties. (57 words)
Source: National Post, Page:
A7, Edition: Thu Nov 29 2001
One: …editorializing
• Column: A young killer gets kid-glove treatment:
Special hearing may set murderer free after just 29
months He may be the luckiest young killer in Canada,
and if his luck continues to hold, he could end up serving
only 29 months for the vicious murder of an elderly
Holocaust survivor he stabbed nine times in the throat in
broad daylight.... (1106 words)
• Two: moral outrage: Dead girl's dad says youth's
sentence a `joke': Dangerous driving: Teenager gets
one year for accident that killed two
Three: …atrocity tales
• Beating victim still
comatose: 'Gang-Style
attack'
Use of charged words…
Four: …serial topicalization … problem defining
event?
• Accused killer in adult court: Reena Virk
case
• Five: valorization of victims: Bill to give
victims of crime more rights: Offenders
would pay into fund to help injured party
• Six: agenda settiong, opposition voiced:
Brief: Quebec: Province wants exemption
from new young offender laws
CONCLUSION
• Valorization of victims,
serious violent offender,
and calls for tougher
legislation symbiotic
• Demand for justice
synonym for punishment
• Remaining questions:
• --did practice bear out
tough policy?
• --does media analysis
support theory?
victims
claimsmakers
public
references