Media and Fear of Crime Essay examples

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MEDIA AND FEAR OF CRIME

The mass media is a vehicle for delivering information and to entertain. But implications that the media do more harm than good concerning its practices and its effects on the public. The two main categories of mass media are print media and electronic media. Although they overlap in some areas, they differ mostly in the subject matter they cover and in their delivery methods. Research had been conducted in using both these forms to gauge the impact that each one has on the public. Print media tends to be more factual based whereas electronic media tend to focus more on visual aids to help relay the information. The public's fear of crime has an impact on the public agenda of policy makers. Fear of crime not only …show more content…
Even more perfect would be the additional use of video footage and sound bites to make the story all the more dramatic for the viewing audience. Crime shows on television, music videos and video games also propagate the endless images of crime and violence into our households.
The advancement of technology, allowed easier access to the electronic media, and enabled viewers everywhere to be a part of whatever current news event was happening, live. The newscast is likely to lead with a reporter stationed far afield for a "live" stand-up at a place "where just hours ago" some calamity has occurred. This is followed by video showing something burning/bloody/damaged, someone screaming, or someone crying (Krajicek, 23). This may lead to the public's heightened fear of being criminalized, even when statistics may show that crime rate is actually at a low rate. Media Monitor, a watchdog group based in Washington, D.C., that tracks the content of network news broadcasts, report that the number of stories about crime on the nightly news programs of ABC, NBC, and BCS doubled during 1993, and coverage on homicides tripled. All this reporting about carnage had an unmentionable catch: national statistics showed that crime had declined during 1993 (Krajicek, 21).

Crime on television can influence the way people think about violence, leading them to a "mean world view," to think that the world is a dangerous and violent
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