Abstract
Criminology is an empirical science, so at the beginning of a course I used to ask my freshmen: ‘What observations and views have you found in society about crime and criminals, including your own?’ We may assume that students beginning a course in criminology have no training in this science and are, therefore, not yet rendered incapable of answering this question. What they know they have learned from social contacts. The term society was narrowed down in the question to neighbors, acquaintances, friends, relatives and newspapers.
Everyone feels capable of reacting to crime.
G. P. H.
‘The removal of mental patients makes us all feel terribly healthy. By casting out criminals we all feel terribly virtuous.’
N. W. De Smit
‘Psychology is a two-ended stick.’
Dostoyevsky
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© 1973 Springer Science+Business Media New York
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Hoefnagels, G.P. (1973). Reactions of Society to Crime. In: The Other Side of Criminology. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-4495-9_2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-4495-9_2
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
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