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Corrections has been a field dominated primarily by men. Women entering in
this field have had to struggle against the resistance presented when entering
these types of jobs. Criminal justice and women have been terms that have not
been heavily associated. However women do play a major role in the criminal
justice system, whether they are the offenders, victims or criminal justice
professionals. The role of women in criminal justice often depicts women as the
victims in order to keep in place the ideologies of women being subordinate,
feeble, and unable to take care of themselves against their aggressor. Women are
not only victimized women also play roles of the offenders and criminal justice
professionals contrary to popular belief. Although women have made strives to
progress they still represent lowest line of sworn in officers Women are very
versatile in their involvement with the criminal justices system. It is also
important for us a as society to understand that women are major functions in
the criminal justice system although their isn’t an enormous amount of
literature about it.
Women are represented in every dimension of the criminal
justice system. The depictions of women in the media are influential factors for
women who have chosen this male dominated work force. The traditional role of
women being housewives and mothers have in some ways hindered the process of
them becoming a dominant work force in the field of corrections. Women As Police
Officers In film it is very noticeable how women are depicted as helpless or are
in need of some type of assistance from her male counterpart. In the Hale
article about women in videos the treatment of women tends to be a social
control. It romanticizes the way women and men are especially in uniform. For
example the man is usually the hero in the film usually he rescues the woman.
The scenario hardly ever plays in the other direction. I personally can’t think
of one movie were a woman police officer rescues the male police officer. A
woman saving a man would challenge our societal ideologies of women being weak
and feeble. I had the a discussion with three women officers, they were all
troopers and one was even a captain and this article really elaborated on the
discussion that I had with these women.
The article really got into the nuts and
bolts of women as criminal justice professionals and it also was very
informative when it discussed the hierarchical role of women as police officers
these women that I spoke with were very clear about the harassment and isolation
on the job. In the article I think the emotional trauma that the author was
speaking are direct results of the harassment and isolation that many women
officers face while on the job. The portrayal of women as not being able to do
the job is a justification of treating women so poorly on the job, when the sad
truth is in many instances their male counterparts want them to fail in order to
assert their male dominance. Women police officers in theory have the same
protections as their male counterparts, however this is a claim that can be
disputed. Women do not have the protection against the images that are presented
in the media. The images that make these women more likely to be taken for
granted by society at large. In videos as well as in society it is a natural
practice trying to label things to make since of it. In this article I think
this claim is justified when we see the woman police officer and we label her a
dyke or lesbian.
If the media throws these types of images into films and video
society tends to think that these women are outside of the norm, their norm
being, (heterosexual/straight) females. If we can tag a label on to these women
it’s almost saying well it’s wrong to be a woman police officer but it is okay
for these women because they are out of the norms of society. She is smart,
beautiful, single, sexy, who is shy? She is the female attorney. Often depicted
by the media as the world’s brightest and most endearing person. The sad fact is
this is just a depiction like many other professions this one to has character
in a sexy body, who is on top of the world. The only sad part about this is she
is a fictional character in the real world of female attorneys. These female
attorneys have not been seen for their professional techniques as an attorney
but rather their vivacious and feminine demeanor. Women attorneys are also
depicted as these powerful and dedicated women who’s only objective is to take
crime of the street.
The article that I chose by Joanne Belknap was a mixture of
Donna Hale, article and the Bailey Pollack Schroder article. In the article it
talks a lot about the obstacles presented to these women. Women overwhelmingly
face discrimination in the work place (Belknap). The article talks about
recruiting practices and how agencies must make extended efforts in order to be
recruited. Although this article didn’t really talk about women in the
adjudication process, women who are judges and police officers still face the
same type of discrimination. Women who are police officers have this additional
element in their careers. Not only do they have to deal with the stress that the
job may present they have to did with external factors that the job brings.
Things like discrimination and unfair treatment in the workplace.
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