Where do you think TV shows like Law and Order get their material? It would take a special kind of depraved mind to think this stuff up. But it happens in real life every day.
It's been going on forever. However, and I've talked about this before, just in my lifetime, the US population has doubled. So if 10% of the population are degenerates, even though the percentage hasn't changed, there are twice as many in the same space. So you're more likely to be closer to it.
That, and the speed of mass communications, makes it seem like there is more crime. Well, there are numerically more crimes, but the percentage doesn't show it as well, because it's the same 10% that are doing it.
(10% being a number pulled out of my, um, hat, but you get the drift).