They over-represent violent & sexual crime, 46% of media reports were about violent & sexual crime, though they only make up 3% of all crimes recorded by the police.
Felson; age fallacy, the media portray victims as older & middle class,
White people & women are over-victimised, ignoring w/c & minority victims.
Media coverage exaggerates police success, the plice are the mainsource of the stories and want to present themselves in a good light.
The media overplay extraordinary crimes, e.g, terrorism.
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Media causes crime
Imitation (providing deviant role models, leading to 'copycat' crime) desentisisation (repeated viewing of violence, causes numbing) transmitting knowledge of criminal techniques, stimulating desires of unaffordable goods, presenting the police as incompetent, glamourising offending.
Criticisms - Schramm; television can be beneficial for children, it is neither harmful nor patricularly good.
Unrealistic fear of crime - The media exaggerates the risks of women, old people etc...Becoming victims, distorting the public impression of crime. Tumber; tabloid readers & heavy users of TV express greater fear of becoming a victim of physical attacks or mugging.
Criticisms - However people may have been already afraid of going out at night, so they stay in and watch more TV.
Relative deprivation -Young; mass media presents image of a materialistic 'good life' that some can't afford. Merton; opportunity is blocked & they experience strain, then commit crime.
Cultural criminology; Hayward; late modern society is media saturated, there is a blurring between reality & images of crime are constructed. People desire to consume crime, through these glamourised images, (fight videos, police car chashes, hiphop stars)
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Moral panics
Folk devils - Cohen; mods & rockers study found the media's reponse to disturbances caused by two groups of w/c teenagers was exaggerated -'Youngsters Beat Up Town', leading to moral panics, that created moral entreprenuers who caused police to be tougher. Then leading to further marginalisation in these groups & a deviance amplification spiral.
Deviance amplification spiral - Cohen; the media are crucial in creating moral panic, because in large scale societies many people have little experience with the groups demonised, they rely on the media for their images. The media create folk devils of youths in gangs, encouraging polarisation (division of groups), then self-fulfilling prophecy of escalating conflict as they acted the roles given.
The wider context - Cohen; moral panics occur in times of social change, people feel anxiety about accepted values being undermined. Boundary crisis occurs which is when there is uncertainty of the boundaries between right & wrong behaviour in a time of change.
Functionalists - Moral panics are ways of responding to the anomie created by change, the media raises collective conscience by dramatising the threat of the folk devil.
Neo Marxists - Stuart Hall; the black mugger in British media, distracted attention away from the crisis of capitalism.
Criticisms - Thorton; late modern audiences are accustomed to 'shock, horror' stories.
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