Why We Care
Improving Society
The Juvenile Justice System is intended to rehabilitate those who are in it. Instead of doing so, it can further traumatize an idividual. It is important address the needs of children in the home, adolescents in the system, prostitutes on the streets, and women in prison. By understanding the effects that child abuse has on the individual, we are better able to prevent crime in their future. By understanding where the juvenile justice system fails, we can improve those departments and develop new ways of addressing the rehabilitative needs of the young people within them. And finally, by understanding how women (and men) end up on the street, how they come to commit survival crimes, and eventually end up in prison, we can better provide necessary and compassionate care while improving their lives. -Dannelle McAnuff
Demonizing the Victim
Many women who engage in prostitution have often been victims of abuse (sexual, physical and/or emotional) therefore they should be viewed as such. Much the abuse occurs when the individuals are adolescents and can continue into early adulthood. Often times it is not a voluntary choice that they are making to be involved in prostitution. We would not look at a child who has been a victim of abuse as a guilty party and tell them that it is their fault. Therefore we should not look at these individuals as if they are at fault for the situation they are in.
The current criminal justice system treats these victims as criminals. These women are victims and should be treated as such. They need extensive counseling and treatment instead of being placed somewhere, locked away, when what they really need is help.
-Amy Nelson
Economic Impact
Incarceration the United States has become the solution to every social problems that we encounter, which cost states billions of dollars a year. The United States holds about 4 1/2 to 5% of the world’s population. Yet we incarcerate 24 to 25% of the world’s prisoners. The United States locks up more people than any other country in the world. Since the 1970s, the number of people locked up in United States has grown from 300,000 to 2,300,000. Instead of only locking up those we are afraid of, we are now locking up those we are mad at as well. We've gone through an explosion of jail and prison construction in this country the cost us billions of dollars to build, and billions of dollars to maintain and run. This has taken money from taken money away from systems/programs that are designed to help people stay out and prevent from going to prison. Programs such as, education (after school programs, college grants and boys and girls clubs), human services, family services and social services that in one way or another could help keep people out of jails and prisons.
Because more money goes to incarcerating individuals, rather than programs that would help aid and/or rehabilitate them, when they are released, they have almost nothing to go to.
In this country, we are criminalizing a huge population of our youth and giving them labels (most of the time for nonviolent offenses) instead of responding to it appropriately within the community, schools and in the home or with social services.
By use throwing juveniles in detention we often reduce the chance that he or she will graduate high school. This raises the chance that the juvenile will commit more crimes later on in life. Most of the time juveniles that go through the system, end up in jail or prison as adults. It cost states an average of $88,000 a year to incarcerate a child. Virginia alone spends $241 per day per juvenile to house them in a detention center, which adds up to almost 7,471 a mouth. States like Virginia spend almost $6 billion dollars a each year incarcerating juveniles: the majority of them held for nonviolent offenses that could be managed safely with in the community.
-Otoniel Pereira