It goes against the grain of deeply embedded cultural attitudes that men can be victims and when men report victimization it is often said that it is an affront to their sense of what it is to be a man. However, men are frequently victimized and this chapter outlined the extent and prevalence of the types of victimization they experience. An important point is that many men and boys occupy the status of both offender and victim and that the two can from time to time become indistinguishable.
In contrast to women, who are much more vulnerable in the private sphere, men have a higher risk of becoming a victim in public space. Most officially recognized interpersonal violence is perpetrated against men and boys by other men and it was suggested that male victims can actively avoid some risky criminogenic environments.
While victimology has rightly highlighted the appalling treatment of female victims by criminal justice agencies, the male victim has also not fared particularly well. The factors underlying the neglect of the male victim are different, though, and are related in part to masculine identities and a lack of understanding of the needs of male victims by the police, courts and wider society.
The causes of male victimization were reviewed and it was suggested that certain unpopular victimological concepts, such as victim precipitation, have perhaps been jettisoned prematurely with regard to violent crime in the night-time economy.
There are established ways of looking at crime victims and this chapter attempted to contest some of our preconceptions about the victimization of men. It is our view that young men and boys can be victimized by the effects of state power and through a consideration of the policy response to ASB we described how this group can be perceived as victims, as well as offenders. A human rights agenda is one way of recognizing the unfair and unjust treatment of young people, as well as being a means to counter punitive policies.
