Moral Outrage and Righteous Indignation

Over the past several decades, societal responses to juvenile crime has evolved from harsh sentences (including death) to more lenient punishments in congruence with our greater understanding of adolescent development. However, some groups of young offenders, such as those convicted of sexual offenses, appear to have fallen victim to a more punitive zeitgeist, where the mitigating effect of age may be diminished. In a 3 x (2) design, participants were randomly assigned to one of three vignette conditions and completed several measures regarding both juveniles and adults adjudicated for sexual offenses, including attitudes, moral outrage, and recommendations for sentence length and registration. Results indicated that adjudicated juveniles are viewed more favourably than their adult counterparts, although both received relatively long sentences. Further, over 90% of participants endorsed some form of registration for juvenile offenders. Implications for offender reintegration and public policy are discussed below.

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“Good” and “Bad” Actors in Digital Space: The Un/Making of a Digital Citizen

New Global Studies ◽

10.1515/ngs-2019-0012 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 14 (1) ◽

pp. 1-23

Author(s):

Phillip Kalantzis-Cope

Keyword(s):

Structural Transformation ◽

Personal Information ◽

The Political ◽

Moral Outrage ◽

Digital Space ◽

Reverse Engineer ◽

Historical Phenomenon ◽

Political Project ◽

Data Informed ◽

Economic Deregulation

AbstractThere has been a firestorm of moral outrage regarding the collection and misuse of personal information by data-informed digital companies. In framing their actions we often make a distinction between “good” and “bad” actors. I investigate the hidden presupposition that informs this dichotomy, by using the figure of the citizen to reveal an underlying structural transformation in the fog of our times. I ask, what can we reverse engineer from this historical phenomenon to derive a meaning of the political project defining the making of “digital space,” which shares meaning with the supposed inherent characteristics of the age, and its relationship to the production, validation, and dissemination of information? I’ll present a case for how an atomization of affinity and failure maps and draws energy from a broader historical agenda of social, political, and economic deregulation. On this basis I ask, what are the implications for understanding the figure of the digital citizen?

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Supplemental Material for Moral Outrage Drives the Interaction of Harm and Culpable Intent in Third-Party Punishment Decisions

Emotion ◽

10.1037/emo0000950.supp ◽

2021 ◽

Keyword(s):

Third Party ◽

Moral Outrage

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Better politics: Narratives of indignation and the possibility of a prosocial politics

Building Better Societies ◽

10.1332/policypress/9781447332022.003.0003 ◽

2017 ◽

Author(s):

Keith Jacobs

Keyword(s):

Moral Outrage ◽

Social Crisis ◽

Subject Positions ◽

Starting Point ◽

Political Struggles ◽

Politics Of Resistance ◽

The Subject

This chapter calls for a truthful understanding of politics that admits the complex and sometimes very contradictory subject positions that people adhere to. There is always a temptation to disengage from contemporary political struggles and instead expend time postulating what a ‘postneoliberal’ future might entail. In examining neoliberalism, the politics of resistance, and prosocial forms of engagement, the chapter argues that a useful starting point is to interrogate the subject positions people adopt to understand the contemporary political era. Often these rely on a depiction of an economic and social crisis accentuated by neoliberalism, a sense of moral outrage, and the attribution of culpability on to those who are considered responsible.

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