Moral Panic

The reading for this week was based on moral panics, which beforehand I saw as a very interesting subject seeing as numerous counts of moral panics are centred around youths and their initial impact on the present society.

The reading gives one example of how the youth were portrayed during a moral panic during the 1960's with the Mods and the Rockers, “the Mods and the Rockers, that took place in several English seaside towns in 1964 became, in the national media, a sign that gang violence represented a new and unprecedented threat to public safety.” (Krinksy:1) In fact this was not the case, only minor skirmishes happened between the two so called gangs and some people blamed the press for over exaggerating what actually happened throughout the sixties. Which leads me to my next point of who actually has the most control of a moral panic, I have come up with four types of groups who are involved:
1.The Offenders
2.The Public
3. The Press
4. The Government
I personally that the press have the most power when it comes to circulating and getting attention towards a moral panic, yes the offenders do cause a problem and sometimes the public to react in certain ways and after it has been established that whatever has gone wrong is a moral panic then the government do get involved and change certain legislation to help combat that problem. But it is the press who keep on hounding at a certain issue, forcing their own opinions onto the public and therefore that outcry onto the government.

A recent example of a moral panic was during last summers London Riots, which once again centred mainly around 'The Youth of Today', but what was also interesting was how the social networks such as Twitter, Facebook and Blackberry Messenger came under heavy fire from the police and government officials for helping to organise potential riots throughout certain areas in London. Once the press got a hold of this news that some youths were using these sites to organise meet ups they ran the story of banning these sites during the riots. Could we argue that some stories are heavily shown to the public to one day help take there freedoms away? I don’t' want to sound like a conspiracy theorist but that seems to be the case.

In conclusion I thoroughly enjoyed this reading as in some cases the author seemed to be sticking up for the youth and their portrayal throughout all senses of media which is a brave thing to do in my honest opinion.

The Reading - Krinsky, C – Moral Panics over Children and Youth - 2008

Advertising

Right, I thought I would start with this clip first just to let you all know that I agree 100% with what Bill Hicks had to say on advertising and marketing and the effects that it has on a consumer society. With that mini rant out of the way I’ll casually move onto the reading.

The reading was at times a very complex one, but after a few re-reads I finally got to grips with the concluding message and what it was trying to portray, (just like many of Andys lectures.) One of the most important quotes that stuck out to me was “the idea is that we consume what objects stand for rather than the products themselves and their product function” (McStay:342) This is because this is the side of advertising that I detest the most, this whole idea that you will become a tall handsome African American if you buy just one pair of Calvin Klein Boxers, or you will have a life time supply of unlimited friends if you get the latest I-Phone, in the end it's
all bullshit and you will still be the same unattractive boring person with or without some very tight underwear.

Throughout the reading there is a sense of consumer belonging, the urge for one to become part of something through the use of their wallet and the products they buy. No one wants to ever feel like they've been left out but spending vast amounts of money on stuff you don't need just seems pretty pointless to me, and at the end of the day, all it is is 'STUFF' and you're stuff should not define who you are as a person but merely give a glimpse into your likes and dislikes and not what you aspire to be.

Don't get me wrong though, I don't see all advertising as an evil plan sent here to warp all our brains, that’s only product advertising. Advertising can be a good thing to, in helping to raise awareness for certain charitable causes such as the RSPCA adverts which are aimed to help us feel bad about Barry The Bear because he lives in a circus in Eastern Europe and in many cases it seems to work and although people do spend money on them at least they were doing it for the right reasons and not just to become something they are not.

In conclusion I did enjoy this reading as it did convey certain other ideologies on why there is a consumer society and why people do spend money on stuff they don't actually need in their lives.

The Reading - McStay, A, (2009) "Consumer Society and Advertising"

Imagined Communities

This perhaps was most probably my favourite so far, seeing as I see myself to be half English and half Welsh I can see both sides of the argument when it comes to the notion of imagined communities. Categorizing myself as half and half comes with many advantages, such as I can choose with nation to represent in any given argument, if the argument is about sport, I’m English, if the argument is about student financing then I’ll be the first one wearing a daffodil and listening to Tom Jones.

This text also heavily links the Rugby into the stereotype of what defines a Welshman, in some ways making it seem like it's the only good thing Wales has got going for them, and the only time they show a sense of pride from being Welsh. This is not true. The only time the Welsh people show any pride is whenever England fail at something, and one might suggest their hatred for England may over shadow their own passion for their own country. Take for example this famous rugby song performed by The Stereophonics which is used at games to rally the fans up, 'As long as we beat the English' is the cry which I think blends in with my point exactly.

The notion of culture also comes into play during this text, “The popular perception of Wales centred upon indecipherable place names, sheep and mining.” (Harris:152) In some ways I can agree with this point because historically this is what Wales is known for, it's almost fact and a fact that the Welsh should be proud of.

The ideology of imagined communities fits in very well when debating about the Welsh, “In contemporary times most of the players who represent Wales, like the large

majority of the population, do not speak the Welsh language.” (Harris:155) Having a sense of pride and community should also include within it your language and the Welsh language is a dying breed and this apparent community that the Welsh seem to have is basically a farce as they all end up speaking the language of their most hated neighbours.

In conclusion I believe that the ideology of 'imagined communities' is just that, imaginary, well at least when it comes to the Welsh. And over-all i saw this reading as a very enjoyable, light hearted and often comical piece of writing which I think clearly helps get its point across to the reader. The author does point at a few stereotypes but also easily counters them with his own perception of what it is to be Welsh which I thought was very clever, and after last weeks reading, was very pleasant indeed and I hope I haven't offended any Welsh people reading this.

The Reading - Harris, J - Cool Cymru, rugby union and imagined community. 151 Ohio,U.S.A

The Culture Industry: Enlightment as Mass Deception

The reading for this week was taken from the chapter "The Culture Industry: Enlightment as Mass Deception" from "Dialectic of Enlightment" by Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer, two members of the Frankfurt School. As previously warned this was a very complex piece of writing and that warning should not be taken lightly, I think the only thing that got me through the reading was the big bottle of barefoot that I purchased beforehand.

One interesting idea that Adorno and Horkheimer convey is that the media industry runs on a production line model, churning out the same repetitive forms of televion, film and radio texts, as the producers of these artifacts know they have been tried and tested and in a way give back the same positive results that previous texts have given.

With Adornos and Horkheimers beliefs on mass entertainment, I do believe that there is a high power, the 1% as people call them who are creating tastless media artifacts to help distract the rest of the 99% from more important real life issues that are occuring everyday in the world, they also use this to set forth their own propaganda onto the rest of the general public and in a sense try and manipulate them into their artifacts and advertisements.

Marshal Mchluhan- The medium is the message

Upon reading Marshall
McLuhans ‘The medium is the message’ I found myself asking if McLuhan had
actually given a definitive answer to his initial theory, I know that this is a
dated text and in some cases and in some examples it does relate to the present
tense but some opinions he expresses very old. In some cases he can break down
his theory with relative simplicity and understanding which frustrated me
whenever he went off course and in a way distracted me whenever he would quote
Shakespeare, which after reading over time and time again I could still not see
the relevance he was trying to portray.
One particular quote I found
interesting was, “The content of any medium, is always another medium”, this
can be used in many forms of digital media today, such as the film industry for
example, the big cinema screens or the smart phone where you can view a film is
seen as the medium, and it is this technology which displays the message, but
without the use of new technologies it would be harder for the message to get
across to a wide audience.
When discussing the
notion of Cyborgs in the seminar class, many people believed that we depend
heavily on technology and thus is therefore shapes our lives, I had to disagree
with this theory for I believe technology does not cover our basic essentials,
such as food, drink and reproduction, none of which technology can accommodate for,
yes you can order food and drink online and get it delivered to your house, the
same as trying to find a partner, but you yourself have to consume either the
food or drink which still makes us human, this contradicts what McLuhan has
stated about the medium is the message because most of the mediums that carry
messages now are new technologies which in the past tense humans never had, so
the message can still be carried without the mediums and still contain significance.
Overall I found the
reading of ‘the medium is the message’ to be somewhat confusing and off topic
in some cases, some examples that McLuhan uses do build up a point he is trying
to prove but there are too many curveballs located within the text which took
me off topic so much when I was trying to get a definitive answer to theory.
The Reading - McLuhan, M. (2001, 1964) Understanding Media, Chapter 1. London:
Routledge