Title: Criminalization - Wikipedia
Headings: Criminalization
Criminalization
Contents
The problems
Principles
Harm
Moral approaches and autonomy
Omission
Procedure
Ontological basis of crime
See also
References
Further reading

Content: Harm
See also: Victimless crimes
Leading criminal law philosophers, such as Dennis Baker and Joel Feinberg have argued that conduct should only be criminalized when it is fair to do so. In particular, such theorists assert that objective reasons are needed to demonstrate that it is fair to criminalize conduct in any given case. The commonly cited objective justification for invoking the criminal law is harmful to others, but it cannot deal with all situations. For example, people are not necessarily harmed by public nudity. Feinberg suggests that offence to others also provides an objective reason for invoking the criminal law, but it clearly does not as offence is determined according to conventional morality. Prostitution is another grey area, as some countries allow it in different forms, and it is hard to say whether or not it specifically harms the public in general. One argument may be that prostitution perpetuates the spread of sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV/AIDS, and therefore harms the public which partakes in the act of prostitution. However, the legalization of prostitution would change the way it is regulated, and law enforcement could find a way to prevent the spread of sexually transmitted disease, thus eliminating the health issue and the question of the morality of the profession would be weakened. People experience a range of physical and social injuries in different contexts which will vary according to the level of economic and political development of their country.