The Reality of Crime Images to Crime - Case Study Example

Crime Images Becoming as Real as Crime Itself Name Institution Date Crime Images Becoming as Real as Crime Itself Introduction True meaning of crime and crime control is found in the debated processes of representational display, symbolic negotiation and cultural understanding. Images of crime are certainly evolving into crime itself. ‘Real’ in this context refers to the ranges of social life that generate consequences; mold attitudes and policy; determine the impacts of crime and criminal justice; produce fear, avoidance and pleasure; and revolutionize the lives of those involved. The mediated anticrime campaigns, countercultural media fabricated imagery and the visually constructed crime waves rotating in a boundless spiral of essence, a mobius strip of culture and everyday life. In the contemporary society; even though the daily life experience can or cannot be saturated with crime, it is without any doubt becoming increasingly saturated with the images of crime (HAYWARD, 2010). This is not just a case of image conception, rather images becoming pliable and changeable due to the keen sense of visual demand in the contemporary society. Hayward notes that the philosophy of velocity reach liquidity of form as images flow from one medium to the other. The technology has made it a lot easier: images are uploaded and downloaded, watsapp-ed, instragram-ed and facebook-ed as well as PhotoShop-ped; the image in the contemporary society is about manipulation and porosity as it is about representation and fixity. The modern society is a mass-mediated society, a society in which information is developed and images disseminated through the ever expanding array of digital technologies. What people see today is largely mediated by image. Terms such as visual cultures have developed which just emphasize how the world is influenced and manipulated by the digital making machinery of the media-world (KITZINGER, 2004). The influence of images and visuals is particularly inherent when considering crime. Newspapers, photographs of surveillance and mug shots of flagrant criminals have featured as part of crime demonstrations in the society. In the present times; crime videos are posted online by criminals themselves, with the agents combing the image making of criminals on the numerous surveillance monitors across the globe. The Video compilations of successful operations of suicide bombs, murder, and the roadside improved explosive device (IED) detonations are uploaded by insurrectionist groups. On the office and personal computer screens as well as on the children mobile phones, images of victimization and brutality appear quite often, with the reality TV shows exposing their viewers to beat cop and prison settings. For sure this overwhelming image and visual presentations in the modern world warrants the development of the visual criminology (SURETTE, 2014). As it is cited in Hayward (2010), the modern world demands a drift from the traditional consideration of images that is limited to the beholders’ symptoms and behaviors. Instead, it is also necessary to consider vitality, effectiveness and efficacy of the images: not just what the perceiver’s actions but also what the images suggest; not only the people’s actions as a result of their connection to the imaged forms but their expected achievements of the imaged forms and the reasons behind such expectations (HAYWARD, 2010). Contemporary ocular representation of transgression, punishment and crime extends beyond the realms of the criminal justice system or order politics and law; this seems to extend even beyond the established comprehension of the media’s role as a vault of clandestine excitement and a consumption system of tragedy and violence. The world today can best be depicted as a much arbitrated crime fest in which the visual symbolization of punishment and crime are advanced in the reality TV theatres of the ridiculous and intervened display of vindictiveness (HAYWARD, 2010). Many would certainly agree with the fact that the visual media has significantly changed from its original role as simply conveying information or relaying entertainment stories about crime, to the actual influence and production of the reality of crime. The reality of crime images to crime itself is further emphasized by the inherent visual work in the police work. The police are increasingly utilizing the camera technology and image monitoring in their everyday practice. Crime management and surveillance have largely taken the orientation of images and visual works. This is reflected by their use of algorithmic surveillance in the identification of known offenders, the dashboard mounted cameras present in the police patrol cars, utility of video recording in the custody suites as well as during the police chamber interrogation proceedings (GREER, 2010). In the political turmoil, demonstrations and protests, the police have identified videotaping and photographing technologies important in the identification of individual and crowd participants. The western police act as consultants in the installation and operation of the public and privately funded urban CCTV systems. Even in managing and nabbing traffic offenders, static and mobile car license plate recognition cameras have increasingly being deployed by the traffic police departments. The image and visual technology have extended to the police uniform and protective gears in which miniaturized uniform and helmet mounted personal video cameras have been deployed. The police force and other law maintenance agencies are indeed overwhelming with the image and visual media technologies (JONES & WARDLE, 2010). The use of visual and image technology in crime based incidences is not limited to the police. The power of visual and image is however being democratized due to the sweeping presence of digital citizenry (LEITCH, 2003). That particular case involving the Critical Mass and NYPD is always highlighted as the best example. During the Critical Mass Cycling event, Christopher Long, an urban cyclist, engaged in a collision with Patrick Pogan, an NYPD officer. Long was arrested and charged on different accounts. However days later, a video of the collision event that was shot by a tourist revealed that the ‘accident’ had in fact been intentionally induced by Pogan, the officer. Various video activists took up the video and used the image in defending civil liberties. This is not a limited scenario. There are many other instances in which video activist groups such as I-Witness Video have specialized in videotaping events having the potentiality to trigger infringements in civil liberties. Their efforts comes in the wake of the threats to justice in which police officers have engaged in video editing techniques, that entail editing images to only include parts that can be used to apprehend suspects who may be innocent. The activist groups are motivated to videotape their own accounts and present them whenever civil liberty is threatened for instance by the police force (MAGUIRE, 2007). In the present times, images of deviance and crime are prime and important marketing tools for selling products in the youth market. The compelling and sometimes lascivious character of certain criminal undertakings provides a handy audience for crime, a fact that has continued as a lasting theme in the famous culture throughout the twentieth century. Through the use of the images, crime has been confiscated, packed and promoted to the youth as a fashionable, romantic, cool and exciting cultural symbol. Under these circumstances, violation and misbehavior evolves into a desirable choice of the consumers. Crime is stylized and sweetened within the consumer culture and presented through the mass media on a similar level as a fashion sweetener or enhancer (JEWKES, 2011). This does not however offer the suggestion that a deterministic link exists between crime and images of violence in the contemporary youth crime and consumer culture; on the contrary this is simply to imply that the difference between the representation of criminality and the hunt for excitement is becoming extremely blurred particularly in the area of youth culture. For example the ‘gangster’ rap blends criminality images with iconography of street gang and urban transgression in the creation of products that are immediately lucrative and seductive to the youth audiences (FERRELL & HAYWARD, 2011). Even more conventional and more socially corrosive, images of transgression and crime presently form prominent themes in the major advertising campaigns (MAGUIRE, 2007). For example in the car entertainment manufacturers Kenwood used the trap line, ‘we want to be free to do what we want to do’, underneath the photograph of the poll tax riots. The image was clearly structured to tap into the subjectivities associated with the offensive driving. Many other car manufacturers promote new car models using similar cultural rubrics. Nissan for instance marketed their Shogun model using the strap line ‘joyriding’ which is wholly ironic given the fact that the model was popular choice for hoisting and ram raiding firms in the 1990s (MAGUIRE, 2007). Crime in the world today has been commoditized to the level that it is not constrained by gender; it has become the mainstream entertainment. While glamorized and stylized images of crime have featured as filmic and televisual staples, today they go beyond straightforward culture wars over censorship in films such as Reservoir Dogs, Trainspotting and Natural Born Killers. Today, popular reality TV police shows such as Justice Files and Protect and Serve turn robbers and cops into prime time entertainers, and traffic and police chase ends into brutal scenes for network television. Even though such trends have produced massive comments, the rise of the so called extreme television has been less discussed. The popular US show Jackass with its mix of nihilistic-hedonism illustrates how certain forms of extreme behaviors (that includes ill advised activities such as shooting oneself in the face with pepper spray and scuba diving in municipal sewage plants) are crossing over into mainstream entertainment. Bubbling under the mainstream are the largely available underground fight videos that feature brutal uncensored ‘caught on camcorder’ schoolyard beatings and street fights, which are both pre-organized and spontaneous (FERRELL & VAN DE VOORDE, 2010). The culture of crime through imaging is not only inherent in the films but also extends to other sources of entertainment such as the video games for the youths. Youths are exposed to the experiences of the deputed wallop of the brutal visual metaphors linked to the crime scene ‘shoot-em-up’ video games e.g. Grand Theft Auto III and True Crime: Streets of LA excitement attained from membership to the many websites of serial killer fan club. Spiraled and looped criminality images are certainly in circulation through the generation of youth cultures that have now become adopted in the various forms and types of associated entertainment and performance. Conclusion In the modern world, crime management and the crime story is intensely and ubiquitously narrated through image and visual. Images of mug-shots, surveillance cameras, videos of suicide attacks and underground fight videos have flooded media and internet imagery sources. In the western society, daily life may or may not be incorporated into crime but is for sure spread out through images of crime. Visual representation of crime, transgression and punishment in the contemporary society goes far beyond the domains of the criminal justice in meaning, situation, affect, efficiency, symbolic power and spectacle. People are no longer a passive but an active audience who consume and transforms crime entertainment (CARNEY, 2010). Through the media and other contemporary technologies, photographic image is a performance. Many events are very much dependent on the presence of camera. However the emphasis is never on what the images present but rather what they produce. Images becoming as crime is demonstrated by crime imagery reflected in many visual works. Pictures of suspected militia and terrorists flood media sources and the internet. The TV screens illuminate with news, programs, shows and films regarding crime ((KITZINGER, 2004)). The promotional activities of most companies have to some extent utilized some aspects of crime to attract larger audiences. The youths have widely adopted the crime culture reflected in their high preferences for the violent and crime related video games, films and other products. BIBLIOGRAPHY LEITCH, T. M. (2003). The problem of the crime film. Cambridge [u.a.], Cambridge Univ. Pres. CARNEY, P. (2010). Crime, punishment and the force of photography. London: Routledge. FERRELL, J., & VAN DE VOORDE, C. (2010). The decisive moment: Documentary photography and cultural criminology. London: Routledge. Top of Form FERRELL, J., & HAYWARD, K. J. (2011). Cultural criminology: theories of crime. Surrey, England, Ashgate Pub. Bottom of Form Top of Form GREER, C. (2010). Crime and media: a reader. London, Routledge. Bottom of Form HAYWARD, K. (2010). Opening the lens: Cultural criminology and the image. London: Routledge. Top of Form JEWKES, Y. (2010). Media and crime. London [u.a.], SAGE. Bottom of Form JONES, P., & WARDLE, C. (2010). Hindley’s ghost: The visual construction of Maxine Carr. London: Routledge. Top of Form KITZINGER, J. (2004). Framing abuse: media influence and public understanding of sexual violence against children. London [u.a.], Pluto Pr. Bottom of Form MAGUIRE, M. (2007). The Oxford handbook of criminology. Oxford [u.a.], Oxford Univ. Press. Top of Form SURETTE, R. (2014). Media, crime, and criminal justice. 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