Social understanding of the punishment of crime Despite societal attitudes influencing political attitudes to reform laws, this has the potential to lower the morale of the legal system. This occurs when the media create negative social views with regard to current punitive justice procedure. In situations where the media act as a sole informant for society, societal understanding of the legal system could therefore be distorted as a result of its representation. Courts are usually open for public viewing and able to provide transcripts that highlight reasons for its sentencing decisions. It also highlights its use of current procedures outlined to it through legislation. However media primarily disseminates court decisions and makes comments …show more content…
The lack of knowledge of the sentencing process essentially leads to the media being relied upon for this sort of information, despite the different media outlets and their objectives, which could be punitive or progressive. As a result, courts such as the Supreme Court of Victoria have responded though utilising social media and other media platforms to make sentencing announcements, as well as provide access to sentencing decisions on its website. Furthermore, Sentencing Advisory Councils being set up in New South Wales further attempt to provide resourceful information to the community regarding the sentencing …show more content…
It has attempted to achieve this through encouraging a more established understanding of sentencing procedures. This is important for the courts, particularly as they have many considerations when actually conducting sentencing, to which might be overlooked when reported by the media. This is outlined by the President of the Victorian Court of Appeal, stating the urge for increased knowledge of the sentencing procedures from sources other than media outlets. “Hearing a judge explain all of the considerations which they had to weigh in the balance gave many people a new insight into sentencing…the closer you get to the sentencing process, and the more you understand about it, the better placed you are to make a judgment about