Moral Panics And Create Folk Devils

chaste Panics And Create Folk DevilsThere ar many musical modes in which the media can incite moralistic solicitudes and produce phratry devils and one way in which this is possible is through labelling. Moral entrepreneurs, who dislike whatsoever crabbed behaviour such as drug takings, may use the media to chuck pressure on the authorities to do something. This is an important element in the process in creating moral affright. This refers to an exaggerated over-reaction by edict to a perceived problem- usually fuelled or inspired by the media. The media excessively function to make the problem bigger and blow it divulge of proportion. There ar many ways in which the media can stimulate this.In a moral panic, the media identify a group as a folk devil. Folk devil can be identified as a threat to inns values. The media also present the group in a prejudicial stereotypical fashion and again exaggerate the scale of the problem. Also the muscular people of the society such as, bishops, politicians and police chiefs condemn the group and its behaviour. normally this would lead to a crackdown on the threatening groups.In spite of this, it may result in creating a self-fulfilling prophecy that amplifies the very problem that caused the panic in the first place. This could be seen in the instance with cases of drugs. As a result police set up drugs squads and in turn descry come out more than drugs and the crackdown identifies more deviates, which then calls for even tougher action creating a deviance amplification spiral.The intimately influential study was by Stanley Cohen, which was feature in his book Folk Devils and Moral Panics. He examined the role of the media and the medias reply to disturbances between 2 groups of teenagers. The Mods and the rockers were twain groups of largely working air division teenagers, at English seaside resorts from 1964-1966, and Cohen examined the way in which this created a moral panic. The mods were di stinguished as wearing smart clothes and rode scooters and listened to pop and soul, whilst rockers wore leather jackets and rode motorbikes and listened to rock and roll. Although in the early stages, distinctions were not very clear.On the Easter weekend 1964 there were a few scuffles and broken windows and some beach huts were destroyed. Although the disorder was minimal, the media over reacted. In Cohens analysis, he uses the analogy of a disaster, where the media produce an inventory or stocktaking of what happened. This inventory contained three things. magnification and distortion are one of them. This is where the media exaggerate the numbers involved and the accomplishment of the military unit and damage, and distort the picture through the dramatic reporting and sensory headlines. Second, is prediction and this were the media regularly predict and assume further conflict and violence will take place. Lastly, symbolisation, and this is where the mods and rockers symbol s such as- their clothes, bikes, scooters and hairstyles- are negatively tagged and associated with deviance.Cohen goes further and struggles that the medias giftal of events produces a deviance amplification spiral by making it seem as if the problem was spreading and getting out of hand. This then led to an increased control response from the police and also courts. This then in turn produced further marginalisation and stigmatisation of the Mods and Rockers as deviants and less tolerance.The media further amplified the deviance by defining the both groups and their sub cultural styles. By emphasising their supposed differences, the media made clear the two distinct identities and transformed loose-knit grouping into two tight knit gangs. This promote polarisation and helped create a self- fulfilling prophecy of escalating conflict as youths acted out roles the media had assigned them.Cohen also observed that the medias definition of the situation are important in creating a moral panic, because in large-scale modern societies, most people put one over no direct experience of the events themselves and therefore have to rely on the media for information about them. In the case of the Mods and Rockers, this allowed the media to portray them as folk devil.However it could be said that the notion draw by Cohen are outdated. Fashion and music have become more diverse, and young people rarely identify themselves with one particular style. Subsequently, society has become more complex, fragmented and liberal and its less clear what constitutes deviant behaviour. Thirdly, politicians are cautious when trying to create a moral panic over, for example, teenage mums, in case they are seen as old-fashioned bullies. McRobbie and Thornton argue that society and the media have moved on and new concepts and ideas. They also bakshish out that early versions of the moral panic model saw society as one influenced by postmodernism, would take a more separate approach.I t has been widely accepted that this is the age of moral panics. From the Bulger case to mad dismay disease, newspaper headlines continually warn of some new danger and television set programmesecho the theme with sensational documentaries. Although todays media audiences are accustomed to shock stories. So it could be said that they do not react to manic to media exaggerations. finally it has been said that the media create moral panic to preserve ruling distinguish hegemony. This was seen in the 1970s mugging, which were sensationalised by the elite to divert the attention from the crisis of the Britain capitalism.In conclusion many of the dramatized stories illustrate many aspects of moral panic and spotlight the way such issues are portrayed and orchestrated by the media. As it is the case with many moral panics become deviants such as the Mods and Rockers, and are deemed threatening to our society as a result of the medias reporting of their views and actions.