Moral Panics: Part one

The problem of communication

Two Models of Communication.

1. Representative.

Based on the following idea:
Event occurs. E.g. Battle in a War.
Reporter goes to the scene, reports the facts
News reports & represents what has happened.
2. Mediated Communication Model.
Event occurs. E.g. Battle in a War.
Reporter goes to the scene, not reports the facts, but interprets
what she sees. REMEMBER EVENTS ARE COMPLEX
News reports & represents what has been constructed.
Viewers compare what they see in news with their own
pre-existing knowledge of the world
Reporter sends copy back to organisation. Story is filtered according to
criteria of newsworthiness. E.g. how important is it, does it effect the
country etc Click Here
The idea of the moral panic.

If we do not take steps to preserve the purity of
blood, the Jew will destroy civilisation by poisoning
us all. (Hitler, 1938)


Surely if the human race is
under threat, it is reasonable
to segregate AIDS victims,
otherwise the whole of man-
- kind could be engulfed.
(Daily Star, 1988)



The more comfortable the language of moral
panics is to us, the more entrenched in our
imagination.
E.g.
The relationship
between Islam
and terrorism
Cohen said the media had created a moral panic;
a condition, episode, person or group of persons
emerges to become defined as a threat to societal
values and interests.
These folk devils are constituted as a threat to the
prevailing social order.

The amount of violence had been minimal.
Most young people who had gone to the seaside did
not identify with either Mods or Rockers.
In short, the mass media had painted a distorted
picture of events.
This set in process a deviancy amplification spiral.
As public concern was ratcheted up, the police
became sensitised to the phenomena




So, who might these other nameless folk devils be?
* Trade Unionists
* Black muggers
* Football hooligans
* Ravers
* Drug dealers
* Young Muslims
* NEETs
* Rioters

The number of reported moral panics in press
grows from the 1980s.

Why?
2 aspects:

The rise of a new political agenda premised on the creation
of folk devils to justify its policy changes.

Intensification of media competition increases use of
sensationalism in reporting.

1980s saw massive expansion in visual media.

Birth of Satellite and cable television.

1970 3 television channels in UK

1984 4 terrestrial channels + 2 satellite

2013 All combined freeview, freesat, sky etc...=
approx 1000 channels.
New technology means quicker reporting.

Newspapers front page could change within
hours.

Also new newspapers appear.
News reporting used to be limited.

Morning and evening newspapers

Midday and evening TV news


With so much competition in market press
needs to push the meaning of
newsworthyness

Increasingly value of news is less about what is
significant rather about what sells.

News is commodified
News increasingly is about spectacle.

Representation of events is about display,
sensation, morally loaded.

This is what fights the competition, gives you
edge.
Society of the Spectacle (1967)
Guy Debord

In societies dominated by modern conditions of
production, life is presented as an immense
accumulation of spectacles. Everything that
was directly lived has receded into a
representation.
Sociologist Anthony Giddens.

The Consequences of Modernity. 1990
Communities no longer built just out of close intimate
relationships.
Important events that effect us occur in far-off parts of
world and take time to reach us.

We need media organisations to help us know
whats going on.