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END THE BIAS
by Armin A. Brott
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In a society conditioned to believe that women are the only victims of bias, the idea that men frequently are as well may come as quite a shock. We're all keenly aware of the pervasive discrimination that exists against women and minorities in the workplace and in many other ares of their lives. But, when we turn our attention to the criminal justice system, it's obvious that there is an equally shocking level of bias. This time, however, men are the unquestioned victims. On average, American men commit a disproportionate number of most types of felony crimes. It's not surprising then, that seven times more men are arrested than women. What is surprising, however, is that after all these accused criminals have had trials, nineteen men are imprisoned for every woman. For burglary, while nine men are arrested for every woman, thirty are imprisoned for every woman. For aggravated assault, 10 men are arrested for every woman, but seventy-nine times more men are incarcerated. Even when it comes to white-collar crimes such as fraud -- where more women than men are arrested -- nine men are jailed for every woman. Some who attempt to explain away men's disproportional likelihood to wind up in jail claim that the "real" problem is racism -- that the percentage of African-American men processed by the criminal justice system is so high that it skews the figures. While few would dispute that racism in the courts is rampant, that alone is not enough. Five African-Americans are arrested -- and six are jailed -- for every Caucasian. That's a difference of about 20 percent. For men and women, however, the difference is closer to 70 percent. The increased likelihood of doing time isn't all men have to worry about. On average, men receive prison sentences that are 40 percent longer than those of women convicted of the SAME crime, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. One might argue that men's longer prison terms are the result of the severity of their crimes and their longer criminal records. But studies that control for these factors prove otherwise. "Women and men with comparable backgrounds do not receive comparable sentence lengths for felony crimes," write researchers Mathew Zingraff and Randall Thomson in "THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF THE SOCIOLOGY OF LAW." "Women are given shorter sentence lengths." Overall, Zingraff and Thomson found that gender contributed more to the determination of sentence length than any other variable they investigated. These findings were confirmed in a recent Los Angeles Times article quoting Department of Justice sources which reported that women convicted of killing their husbands receive an average sentence of only six years, while male spousal killers got 17 years. So why is there such strong anti-male bias in the courts? Gender bias researchers Jon Ryan and Ian Wilson, suggest that the answer is based on three ancient stereotypes. First, women are born more innocent than men (so judges -- who are predominantly male -- see women as less capable of committing criminal acts); Second, women are more reformable than men (and thus less punishment is necessary to straighten them out); Third, women are less dangerous than men (and are therefore less of a threat to society). For more than 20 years, women have complained about similar stereotypes that have been used to keep them out of the board room, the Senate, and even combat. They rightfully resent being treated as children who don't know how to take care of themselves. But when it comes to taking responsibility for their behavior, women seem perfectly content to allow law enforcement officials and judges to gallantly rescue damsels in distress. Unfortunately, such well-intentioned chivalry usually turns out to be nothing more than paternalism that demeans and oppresses the very people it seeks to protect. As women have struggled for equality, feminists of both sexes have fought to break down all types of gender-based discrimination and have demanded that women be treated the same way men are. In some areas, that's a goal we should all be striving for. But in the case of our criminal justice system, it's time we started treating men the same way we treat women.
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