Media and Crime Flashcards
The media’s picture of crime vs official stats:
Media over-represents violent/sexual crime- Ditton & Duffy (1983) found 46% of media reports about this, but
police recorded stats say they’re only 3% of all recorded crime.
* Media portrays criminals/victims as older and MC- Felson (1998) calls this age fallacy.
* Media exaggerates police success- in clearing up cases. This is because police uncover most crime stories and
want to be portrayed well, and because media over-represents crime that have higher clear-up rates, like violence.
* Media exaggerates the risk of victimisation- in women, white people & high status individuals.
* Media overplays extraordinary crimes- Felson calls this dramatic fallacy, as well as making us believe one has to
be daring/clever to commit or solve crime (ingenuity fallacy).
distorted picture of crime painted by the news
media reflects teh fact that news is a social construction. It is not news that does not simply exist out there waiting to be gathered in and written up by the journalist rather tit is the outcome of a social process
News value and coverage
- Distorted media reporting of crime shows that
news is socially constructed, Cohen & Young (1973)
argue news is manufactured, not discovered. - News values are the criteria by which
journalists/editors decide if a story is
newsworthy/deserves coverage:
1. Immediacy- breaking news
2. Dramatisation- action/excitement
3. Personalisation- human interest stories
4. Higher-status- people/’celebs’
5. Simplification- eliminating shades of grey
6. Novelty/unexpectedness- a new angle
7. Risk- victim-centred stories about
fear/vulnerability
8. Violence- visible and spectacular acts - News media gives crime so much coverage because
it’s considered unusual and extraordinary.Ne
Fictional Representations of Crime
- Mandel (1984)- ~10 billion crime thrillers were sold worldwide between 1945-84, while ~25% of
prime time TV are crime shows/movies. - This tells us that fictional representations are an important source of our knowledge on crime.
Surette (1998)- fictional reps of crime, criminals and victims follow the ‘law of opposites’ because they
oppose what official stats tell us: - Property crime is under-represented while violence/drugs/sex crimes are over-represented.
- Real-life homicides happen due to brawls/domestic disputes, while fictional ones come from
greed/calculation. - Fictional sex crimes are committed by strangers/psychopaths, while in reality it is acquaintances.
- Fictional cops usually get their man.
Despite this, recent trends indicate a new genre of ‘reality’ infotainment shows that feature non-white,
younger, underclass offenders. Increasingly, police are being portrayed as corrupt and brutal instead of
successful.
The media’s picture of crime vs official stats:
There’s been a shift in what crime the
media covers, Schlesinger &
Tumber (1994)- ‘60s focus was
murder and petty crime, but ‘90s
reporting widened to drugs, child
abuse, terrorism and more.
* Soothill & Walby (1991)- found
newspaper reports of rape cases went
from under 1⁄4 of all cases inn 1951 to
over 1/3 in 1985.
The media as a cause of crime: Fear of Crime
- The media exaggerate how much violent/unusual crime there is in society, and exaggerate the risk of certain groups being victims. Therefore, the media is distorting the public’s impression of crime, giving them an unrealistic fear of it.
- Gerbner et al- found heavy users of TV (4+hrs) had higher levels of fear of crime.
- Schlesinger & Tumber (1992)- correlated media consumption and fear of crime, as heavy TV users and tabloid readers had increased fears, especially of
mugging/physical attack. - However, this doesn’t mean the media is causing an increased fear, as those already afraid of going out at night watch more TV simply because they’re
home more. - Greer & Reiner (2012)- studies of the effects of media ignore the different meanings viewers give to media violence, such as distinguishing between
cartoon, horror and new violence.
the media negatively affects attitudes, values and behaviour in people, especially
vulnerable groups like the young, lower-class and undereducated.
There are ways the media may cause crime
and deviance:
Imitation- deviant role models leads to copycat crimes.
2. Arousal- through viewing violent/sexual imagery.
3. Desensitisation- through repeatedly viewing violence.
4. Transmitting knowledge of criminal techniques.
5. As a target for crime, theft of TVs.
The media ,relative deprivation and crime
- Lab based research has looked into if media portrayals of crime/deviant lifestyles leads viewers to commit crime
themselves. - Left realists argue that the mass media is increasing the
sense of relative deprivation among marginalised
groups. - In today’s society even the poorest groups have media
access, where they see images of a materialistic ‘good’
life of leisure and consumer goods as the norm. - This stimulates marginalised group’s sense of relative
deprivation and social exclusion, which may be what
pushes them to commit crime.
Cultural Criminology the media and crime
- Cultural criminology argues that the media
makes crime itself a commodity that people
desire. - Instead of producing crime in their audience,
media encourages them to consume crime. - Hayward & Young (2012)- late modernity is
media-saturated, with an ever-expanding tangle
of fluid digital images, including of crime. - This causes the image and reality of crime to blur
and be indistinguishable- EG- gang assaults aren’t
caught on camera, they’re staged for it to be
released as underground fight videos.
similarly police car cameras dont just record police acticity they alter the way in which police works.
CC:Media and the commodification of crime
Another feature of late modernity is the emphasis on
consumption, excitement and immediacy- Hayward & Young
argue crime and its thrills are commodified.
* Corporations/advertisers use media images of crime to sell products, EG: hip hop combines images of street criminality with consumerist success.
* Fenwick & Hayward (2000)- crime is packaged and marketed to young people as an exciting, cool and fashionable cultural
symbol.
* Hayward & Young argue that mainstream products do this too, like car ads with pyromania/joy riding/street riots, ‘heroin chic’, imagery of the forbidden (brands Opium, Poison, Obsession).
Moral Panic-
exaggerated over reaction by society to a perceived problem-usually driven or inspired by the media where the reaction enlarges the problem out of all proportion to its real seriousness.
Moral Panic
The media identifies a group as a folk devil or threat to societal values
the media present the group in a negative stereotypical fashion
moral entrenpeneurs editors poltiicians police chiefs bishops and other respectable authorities condemn the group and its behaviour
Here, a ‘crackdown’ on the group is called for, but this can create a self-fulfilling prophecy that then amplifies
the problem.
Media can cause crime and deviance through l….
The media can cause crime and deviance through labelling, as moral entrepreneurs who disapprove of certain behaviour will use the media to pressurise authorities to ‘do something’
about it.
* If they succeed, their campaigning will result in the negative labelling of behaviour, and even law changes, like the Marijuana Tax Act in the USA.
* By helping to label smoking weed as criminal (even though it was legal), the media helped to cause crime.
* A part of this process is creating a moral panic- an
exaggerated over-reaction by society to a perceived problem, often driven by the media.
Mods & rockers:
- Cohen (1972)- focused on the media’s response to disturbances between the mods and rockers, 2 young WC groups who had different dress
senses and modes of transport. - The initial confrontations were on Clacton beach in 1964, they were little more than scuffles.
- In response, the media over-reacted to the minor disorder. Cohen argues they had an ‘inventory’ of 3 elements:
1. Exaggeration & distortion- the media exaggerated numbers involved and the extent of the violence/damage using sensational headlines like ‘Day of Terror by Scooter Gangs’. Non-events such as the ‘town held their breath’ for invasions that didn’t happen.
2. Prediction- the media regularly assumed and predicted further violence/conflict from the group.
3. Symbolisation- the symbols of the mods and rockers (clothes, bikes and scooters, hairstyles, music, etc were all negatively labelled and associated
with deviance.
Cohen:Deviance amplification spiral
Cohen argues that the media’s portrayal of
events causes a deviance amplification spiral
by making it seem like the problem was
spreading and getting out of hand.
* This led to more calls for harsher responses
from police/courts, but this only caused
further marginalisation and stigmatisation of
the mods and rockers.
* The media emphasised their differences into
2 distinct identities, transforming 2 loose-knit
grouping to tight-knit gangs.
* Here we can see how the call for more
punishment and control of the situation
actually caused a spiral of more
deviance/calls for action instead of resolving
the issue.
Cyber Crime
The emergence of new crimes is often met with moral panics, like horror comics, TV, cinema, video
games and more being accused of corrupting the young and undermining public morality.
* Thomas & Loader (2000)- define cyber crime as computer-mediated activities that are
illegal/considered illicit, and are conducted through global electronic networks.
* Jewkes (2003)- the internet gives opportunities for conventional crime like fraud, as well as new
crime that use new tools, like piracy.
Wall (2001) defines 5 categories of cyber-crime
- Cyber-trespass: crossing boundaries into others cyber property, including hacking, sabotage, and
spreading viruses. - Cyber-deception and theft: identity theft, phishing and violation of intellectual property rights.
- Cyber-pornography: includes porn involving minors and opportunities for children to access porn
online. - Cyber-violence: psychological harm or inciting physical harm. Includes cyber-stalking, hate crimes and
bullying. - Global cyber crime: policing cyber crime is hard because of the sheer size and globalised nature of
the internet, which also causes issues of jurisdiction (where to charge the person).
Wider context :Mods and Rockers
Cohen puts the mods and rockers moral panic into the
context of chine during post-war British society.
* He argues moral panics occur at times of social change,
which reflect the anxieties people feel about accepted
values being undermined.
* Mora panics are therefore often the result of boundary
crisis, and folk devils the media symbolises give a focus to worries about social disorder.
* Functionalists- moral panics are a way of responding to
the sense of anomie/normlessness that change brings.
Dramatizing the threat as a folk devil, the media raises
collective consciousness and reasserts social control.
* Hall et al (1976)- takes a new-Marxist view, locating the
role of moral panics in capitalism by using the 1970s media focus on muggings to distract from the crisis of capitalism.
* Contemporary moral panics- dangerous dogs, asylum
seekers, child sexual abuse, Aids, single parents and more.
crticisims of the idea of a mral panic
Assumes society over-reacts, but who decides what’s
disproportionate?
* What turns the amplifier on/off?- why can the media cause
some moral panics about things but no others?
* Late modernity- today’s audiences are used to ‘shock,
horror’ stories, so McRobbie & Thornton (1995) argue
moral panics are less impactful now as they’re routine.
There’s also less consensus about what’s deviant, so it’s
harder for the media to create moral panics.
two ways in which the media may cause crime tips
media poereays attractive lifesyles
the media offer images of a desirable lifestle of consumption and leisure
advertising presents consumerism as smoething to be value
for the poor this accentuates feeligns of relative deprivation
so they turn to crim to obtain desired good
Eval:rekatuve deorprivation does not always lead toc rime
evaluate sociological explanations of emdia genrated moral panics (30 marker) tips
explain moral panic-explain how it is a form of labelling that results from societalr eactionn and createes deviant identities and careers
explnations:choehn boundary crisis
response to anomie(functionalism
