Media Presentation

Hey everyone. This is for the 1MA/3 class. If you're 1MA/4 your article for this week is here. 1MA/3 here's 2 articles to read for Thursday:

http://socyberty.com/society/fear-and-consumption-in-the-mass-media/
http://dreamera.hubpages.com/hub/bowling-for-columbine-culture-of-fear

Fear and Consumption in the Mass Media

by Carlos h in Society, November 20, 2008

Does the mass media have an interest in keeping the public fearful?

Plot to blow up Heathrow jets, T.V girl’s stalking, Brit woman executed by Taliban, Alarm as violent crime soars, City worker kills wife ­­- just another average week or so in the newspaper headlines, as we are left scarcely wondering where the saying “no news is good news” comes from.  More often than not, what we read about in the paper, and what we see in television reports is in many ways morbid, in most ways heart-wrenching, often tragic or saddening and rarely without the stigma of fear attached.  But why? – Surely there is some good in the world? -  We all know that there is.  Surely the mass media can find something, many things to report on that are positive and comforting?  Or is it simply in their interest to keep the public fearful?

Consider this:  Every day, your chosen newspaper only ever reported on good deeds and upward turns, the news you watched at night only ever showed pleasant and heart-warming images, and ever so slowly you felt safer and more secure with each passing day.  Eventually, you stopped watching the news and would rarely read the paper, as you found less and less reason to pay money to be comforted.  – The mass media relies on our fear to create consumption.  If we weren’t worried about where not to go at night, if we weren’t fearful of terrorism coming to our homes, if we weren’t worried about murderers, rapists, paedophiles and other criminals, if we weren’t worried about our kids becoming drug addicts, if we didn’t fear rising oil prices or dire inflation and economic times we would rarely find the need to find out where, how, when and why it was going to happen next.  Granted, the mass media plays a certain role in ensuring public safety by allowing that we know these often gruesome facts, but how often are the headlines and more ambiguous details misconstrued in ways that pique our fears, and play on our often fragile emotions.  How many people are going to walk past a newspaper headline that reads: Man kills family in brutal home invasion?

The human race has long been living vicariously through other people’s misery.  We gain perspective and positivity in our lives by lapping up the misery that others are experiencing – whether we like it or not, and whether we are actually even aware or free to choose.  We tune in to our favourite reality T.V shows to see who gets voted off next (and how many of those are saturating our screens these days!) we watch documentaries on the lives of the latest, sad freaks of nature that television producers have found in some obscure community somewhere in our world, we watch people dying in horrific accidents on the latest “World’s scariest moments caught on tape!”, and the news itself – you get what I am talking about …
So what’s my point?  -  The point is, while there is obviously some need for us to be aware of what bad is being done in our world, maybe the gross amount of fear that the mass media creates (almost always for their own gain) is actually perpetuating the violent crime and addictions,  rising oil prices and economic hardship that we are being warned against?  -Maybe the fear that is ensuring our consumption is far more real and far more prevalent than it needs to be?  After all, no news is good news right?

Bowling for Columbine -"Culture of Fear"

Bowling for Columbine

For the past decade many schools have presented Bowling for Columbine. The documentary presented the viewers with the idea of how schools, society and the government have a delicate relationship to one another. In this movie we were presented with the idea of fear. “Culture of fear” is a term used by many politicians, scholars and authors who believe that public figures/icons in America try to incite fear into people for their own personal gain. The reward for public figures who promote this fearful behavior is money and incentives. Fear leads to consumption and consumption means large profits for corporations like ADT (home security and Surveillance Company) because consumers are purchasing their merchandise. My paper will try to explain why people are afraid of things, in which reality are harmless.

In the documentary Bowling for Columbine Michael Moore demonstrates that people are afraid of things that shouldn’t be feared of. For example, during the 1990’s as crime rates dropped majority of Americans believed that crime incidents were on the rise. Why did people in the 1990’s rank drug abuse as the greatest danger to America’s society but when in reality drug abuse decreased? How and why are people afraid of things that they shouldn’t be? The answer lies within the idea “culture of fear”.

The picture of fear is unfortunate. A crystal clear, real life example of fear is the tragedy that occurred at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado in April 1999. Two high school boys killed 12 students and one teacher along with wounding many other students. In Bowling for Columbine, Michael Moore defines fear when students and teachers are hiding underneath tables when Eric and Dylan raided their schools with shotguns, pistols and rifles. At the end, the students turned the guns on themselves. Eight years later there was another deadly massacre that occurred on school grounds at Virginia Tech on April 16, 2007. A student went on a rampage and killed 32 including him.

Fear plays an important part in society on a macro and micro perspective. When there is panic in the atmosphere everyone gets affected. There was once a time when parents felt comfortable sending their kids to school but nowadays their constantly reminding their kids to be careful to who you talk to and associate yourself with. When I went to high school we had to go through metal detectors. Besides having to go through metal detectors, we had to at all times have our I.D’s visible. More and more elderly people are afraid of going outside of their home alone.

Once again why are people afraid? I believe that the media feeds into people’s fear. The nightly news, television shows like Criminal Minds and C.S.I Miami creates fear for people. A large portion of the nightly news is either broadcasting a murder, rape or drug case. The news media spends less than ten minutes on something positive that happened locally or globally. When people watch these types of announcements and absorb more violence than peace they get emotions like fear and panic. They fear that they or their loved ones can be murdered or raped.

So how has all this fear affect us on a small scale and as a nation? The fear of terror has had a negative impact in our society in all ways imagined: politically, socially and economically. Because of fear and for the fight against terrorism the United States government, along with support of many citizens, allowed the National Security Agency to listen to phone conversations and store 1.7 billion emails. .After the attack on the twin towers mass fear was created in our society. Because of fear of Muslims, people across New York City were afraid/against the construction of a mosque and community center because of what happened on September 11, 2001.

So who’s the to blame for the massacres and violence that happens in our society? Is it the president of the United States? Is it the president of the NRA (National Rifle Association), who promotes the use of guns in communities? In conclusion if someone is going to be blamed it should be the media. If the media changed the way they broadcasted national television then a lot of people wouldn’t have thoughts and fears to begin with. If you display peaceful actions you’re more prone to do a peace than violence. If the media displays more events that settles problems in a passive way people will realize. Many people don’t realize that the media affects our life in every possible aspect. With that being said the media can affect our lives in a positive way instead of always a destructive way.