Media and Crime - Sensationalizing the Issue - Essay Example

12 November Media and Crime Sensationalizing the Issue The media is not an entirely reliable source of knowledge about crime and criminality. While helpful, statistics are often misconstrued and facts grossly misinterpreted. Motivation behind the reporting and the reliability of the source of information are also factors in reliability of reporting. Each individual must decide the credibility of a source based on its reputation for accuracy. There are two separate ways crime statistics can be determined: using reported crime facts and interpreting patterns of unreported crime through surveys (Crimestoppers 2009). Determining the crime rate based solely on reported crime and number of arrests can be inaccurate because not all crime is reported and not all arrests turn into convictions. According to Crimestoppers U.K. (2009), recorded crime provides a majority of the crime statistics and can determine the amount of police manpower necessary to keep crime in check. However, it is the surveys that provide more valuable information about unreported crime. Crimestoppers states that “The BCS (British Crime Survey) count also gives a better indication of trends in crime over time because it is unaffected by changes in levels of reporting to the police and in police recording practices.” In Pfeiffer’s (2007) preface, she states that her motivation to write a book about mentally ill persons in prison stems from a statistic regarding suicide that had been prepared about conditions of New York State prisons. In her further research, the high suicide rate that she had read about turned out to be a conservative figure. Pfeiffer realized that the statistics reported were grossly inaccurate and decided that she needed to find out the truth for herself. Throughout her book, she follows the stories of six mentally ill inmates who ultimately took their own lives. On page eleven Pfeiffer states, “When people commit suicide, rarely is the information released to the public. When reporters ask for it, they are given minimal details and told to wait for official reports.” Pfeiffer’s discovery opens another aspect to why the media is not always an entirely reliable source of information regarding crime. A reporter can only relay the facts they are given. The reporter has no choice but to relay the information he has been given, and if the information is inaccurate that is how it will be reported. Where the information comes from initially plays a huge role in the accuracy of the report. Leighton (2007) states that, “Statistics are tricky. For every statistic designed to enlighten, there is a statistic designed to mislead.” Leighton further explains why the news media is not reliable when reporting crime facts. His two examples are based on national network coverage of crime. According to Leighton, “Between 1992 and 1993, major network evening news coverage of homicide tripled, even though the homicide rate went down.” His second example is of dramatic fictional crime shows such as Law and Order and CSI (Crime Scene Investigation), popular network television shows based on how criminals are caught. Sensational reporting occurs when reporters and writers stretch the truth to improve ratings. National news networks are funded by their ratings. In order to improve their ratings, they either over-report crimes or exaggerate the details. The motivation behind reporting is to improve ratings, not to increase public awareness. Motivation is a decent indicator of whether or not the type of media reporting the crime can be completely trusted. According to www.dictionary.com, the definition of sensationalism is a “subject matter, language, or style producing or designed to produce startling or thrilling impressions or to excite and please vulgar taste.” Sensationalism is a staple of modern reporting. “Startling” and “thrilling” impressions improve ratings, and stretching the truth to cause theses types of reactions is what the media commonly does. Another type of media sensationalism is through popular television shows that glamorize crime. In Schmid’s (2005, p. 13) introduction to his book, he discusses how sensationalism has stayed prominent throughout modern culture: “Sensational coverage of crime has always had a prominent place in American popular culture, from the earliest forms of colonial popular literature, through the ‘yellow journalism’ of the nineteenth century, to the true-crime book and slasher movie of today.” He further explains the concept of “tabloidization,” a term he defines as the media lowering their reporting their reporting standards in order to boost ratings and keep the audience interested. The popular Showtime series “Dexter” popularizes a serial killer who murders other murderers in Miami. According to Schmid, the rise to huge popularity of this show is the media’s attempt to put a likeable face to a criminal. At the time of the writing of this paper, over 10,000,000 facebook users “liked” the Dexter page. Dexter is a great example of sensationalism because his character is the perfect way to make a serial killer likeable. The character of Dexter works for the Miami Metro Police Department and only kills other bad characters that have committed murder themselves. The creators of Dexter make his character extremely hard not to like and admire. In essence, he is a crime-fighting, superhero-like serial killer who abides by a code of ethics. This sensationalism of a murderer is a great example of why the media is an unreliable source of information. If over ten million people are basing their opinions of serial killers on this likeable character, then the overall public opinion of serial killers must be increasingly favorable. Are the majority of serial killers attractive forensic analysts moonlighting by a code of ethics? Probably not. Because of this extremely popular show does the public form their opinions from this sensational form of media? Most likely, yes. Sensationalizing a serial killer as a form of entertainment has romanticized a form of crime. In Dubner’s (2010) introduction to his book on crime reporting, he chastises society for not knowing much about crime even though it is widely obsessed about. He says that when the recession began in 2008, the prevailing opinion was that crime would automatically increase. The popular opinion was wrong, because crime did not suddenly increase. Dubner claims that there are many common reasons for crime that the general public is not aware of. He discusses a correlation between the legalization of abortion in 1973 to a decrease in crime a generation later. He claims that unwanted children commit more crime, therefore the crime rate decreases when fewer unwanted children are born. Dubner also states that half of the twenty most popular television shows in 2008 were crime shows. In contrast, only two of the twenty most popular television shows in 1992 were crime shows, and that was when crime had reached it peak. Overall, because of the inaccuracy of media reporting and the use of sensationalism, it becomes necessary to pick and choose information based on what appears to be the most credible. Fisanick’s book presents opposing viewpoints on crime and criminals. Fisanick (2010, p. 11) states that “the more inundated we become with differing opinions and claims, the more essential it is to hone critical reading and thinking skills to evaluate these ideas.” Basically, Fisanick is saying that it is a person’s individual responsibility to sift through the information they receive in order to verify its accuracy. For example, a person standing in line at the grocery checkout more than likely will see a tabloid cover stating that the world is ending or a new flesh-eating virus has emerged to quickly wipe out the world’s population. Instead of panicking, the majority of modern people will have no choice but to laugh. There is an underlying, unspoken understanding in today’s culture that some sources can be trusted more than others. New information emerges each day on countless subjects. It is important to consider the source’s background and reputation when deciding whether or not the fact or statistic is credible. There are many examples of the concept of media and moral panics. The Oxford Online Dictionary (2011) defines moral panic as “an instance of public anxiety or alarm in response to a problem regarded as threatening the moral standards of society.” The media uses the concept of moral panic to accomplish their own agenda. Primarily, the media wants to increase their ratings, so they cause moral panic through sensationalism. In addition, the media is an important part of the political process. In today’s age, the internet and television are the primary methods of learning about a political candidate. In order to gain control over a political race, the media has the ability to sway public opinion one way or the other. For example, the general consensus is that Fox News is democratic while CNN is more republican. O’Sullivan defines moral panic as “those processes whereby members of a society and culture become morally sensitized to the challenges and menaces posed to their accepted values and ways of life, by the activities of groups defined as deviant.” Moral desensitization by the media is an often over-looked issue. The majority of people who watch popular television crime shows are hardly affected by the rampant death those shows portray. O’Sullivan is saying that the media causes moral panic because members of todays’ society are desensitized. Schmid (2005, p. 15) discusses an example of moral and media panic in his book: “The media, along with government agencies, law enforcement officials, and reform groups worked together to produce a ‘serial killer panic.’ The key elements of this panic were that serial murder was a qualitatively new phenomenon, that it was growing enormously, that there were a large number of serial murderers active at any given time, that serial murder was a distinctively American phenomenon, and that the crime had reached epidemic proportions, claiming four thousand victims a year.” Even though these statistics about serial killers were inaccurate, the media was able to convince the general public that it was true. A widespread fear of serial killers was caused even though it was not entirely accurate. The media has a huge ability to control public opinion as well as moral panic. In 1981, a moral panic occurred regarding a new disease that the general public knew nothing about. Cichocki (2007) says it was referred to as the ‘gay cancer.’ The media caused moral panic with its reports of the new disease, says Herdt: “the moral panic… occurred in Britain during the 1980’s, largely constructed through media reports of various events and responses to HIV/AIDS.” Herdt tells the story of a naïve young eighteen year old who punched and killed a gay man because he thought the gay man had given him AIDS from sharing his drink. Because relatively little initially was known about the disease, it was easy for the media to create moral panic. The thing people are the most scared of is the unknown. The ultimate fear becomes a terrifying new disease that slowly and painfully kills you and no one knows how contagious it can be. Another great example of how the media influences moral panic can be seen in the 2009 H1N1 scare. Shaban discusses how the media’s use of a few key terms incited the most panic regarding the H1N1 flu virus: “The emotive loading of basic epidemiological terms like ‘outbreak’ and ‘pandemic’ has seared the public’s fear of the infection, which for the most part is much less severe than seasonal flu.” Basically, because the media was using scary words like pandemic, the public’s fear became much worse than it needed to be. It was common that winter to see people walking around with masks because they were terrified to die from the H1N1 virus, even though the regular flu would go on to claim more lives than that particular strain in 2009. It is fascinating how the media does this. Shaban refers to the panic as “media hype.” The same situation occurred with bird flu, as well as anthrax. In the United States, following the terrorist attacks of September 2001, the slightest thing could cause a moral panic. One such moral panic instigated by the media was the threat of anthrax. Fahmy states that media outlets “vigorously covered the terrorism story” following the terrorist attacks. The media created a link between the findings of anthrax on envelopes in the mail with terrorism and created moral panic. Another example of moral panic directly linked to September 2001 is the story of two police officers in Maryland pulling over two trucks they suspected carried explosives. Walker (2002) tells the story: “The alert cops blocked traffic for an hour, searching the vehicles for tools of terror. On examination, the cargo turned out to be stage equipment bound for a memorial service for the firefighters killed on September 11.” This example is all too common directly following such a large terrorist attack. Because the media caused such panic, and also because the terrorist attack was a horrifying event that claimed so many innocent lives, there is the idea that one cannot be “too careful.” In his article, written shortly after the 9/11 attacks, Walker says there were a lot of “bomb scares, germ scares, and nervous airlines.” This moral panic caused by the media could be felt all around the world. After such a horrific event, the public, fueled by an over-dramatic media, have almost no choice but to panic. The media cannot be trusted to provide entirely accurate information regarding modern issues and events. Through moral desensitization and dramatic reporting, the media creates social panic. When deciding on whether to believe something reported by the media, it is important to consider the source’s reputation as well as their motivation behind the report. Also, when issues such as H1N1 turn into moral panic, it is important to keep a clear head and consider strictly the facts, not the “media hype” as Shaban termed it. The media can be a useful source of information as long as an individual uses his personal filter to weed out the extraneous and exaggerated detail. Word count: 2,315 (excluding references) Works Cited: Cichocki, Mark (2007). The History of HIV, accessed 13 November 2011, http://aids.about.com/cs/aidsfactsheets/a/hivhis.htm. Crimestoppers Trust (2009). Latest Crime Statistics, accessed 12 November 2011, http://www.crimestoppers-uk.org/crime-prevention/latest-crime-statistics. Dubner, Stephen J. The Best American Crime Reporting 2010. New York: Harper Collins, 2010. Fahmy, Shahira. “Mediating the Anthrax Attacks: Media Accuracy and Agenda Setting During a Time of Moral Panic.” Illinois: Atlantic Journal of Communication, 2007. Fisanick, Christina. Crime and Criminals. United States: Greenhaven Press, 2010. Herdt, Gilbert H. Moral Panics, sex panics: fear and the fight over sexual rights. New York: NYU Press, 2009. Leighton, Paul 2007. What Every American Should Know About Crime and Criminal Justice, Amazon, accessed 12 November 2011, http://stopviolence.com/cj-knowledge.htm. O’Sullivan, Tim. Key Concepts in Communication. Methuen, 1983. Oxford University Press (2011). Oxford Dictionaries, accessed 12 November 2011, http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/moral+panic. Penzler, Otto and Thomas H. Cook. The Best American Crime Reporting 2008. New York: Harper Perennial, 2008. Pfeiffer, Mary Beth. Crazy in America. New York: Carroll and Graf Publishers, 2007. Schmid, David. Natural Born Celebrities: Serial Killers in American Culture. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005. Shaban, Ramon. “H1N1 Influenza 09-Managing the ‘Moral Panic.” Australia: Australasian Emergency Nursing Journal, 2009. Walker, Jesse. “Panic Attacks: Drawing the thin line between panic and hysteria after September 11.” Reason.com, March 2002 issue, accessed 13 November 2011, http://reason.com/archives/2002/03/01/panic-attacks. Read More