Crime in Media: Analyzing Moral Panic and Portrayal of Children

This essay delves into the aspects of the moral panic model and media portrayals of children, drawing upon examples like the Mods and Rockers phenomenon and reports of knife-wielding clowns. It highlights how the media often identifies groups as threats, employs stereotypes, and overstates problems, creating unnecessary panic and fear. The analysis reveals that media reports frequently lack evidence and exaggerate situations, presenting a negative image of certain groups, such as youth and clowns, thus creating intense fear among the public. The essay concludes that in both scenarios, the media published reports without evidence, created unnecessary panic, exaggerated the situation, and presented certain groups as evil, leading to the creation of imaginary stories that intensify fear among the public.

Running head: CRIME IN MEDIA
What aspects of the moral panic model are in effect with the story?
The group of folks have been identified by media as devil or threat to societal values. Media
had shown that group of folks are of stereotypical fashion. Media overstate the problem than
the actual problem. Negative image of folks had been portrayed by media. A normal incident
had been shown by media as riots. Politician, moral entrepreneurs, editors, police chiefs and
other respected peoples have condemned the behaviour of the group of folks. These two
groups had created worrying and shocking violent disturbance at holiday resorts around the
UK. One group called Mods were the fashioned conscious groups and they had been
identified as cropped hair, motor scooters, mirrors, lights and bump bars. Another group
called Rockers had been identified by long hair, motorbikes, and leather jackets. However,
Cohen had found the evidence that was motorbike and the scooter gangs, but there was no
evidence, Cohen had been found that there was a rivalry between the scooter and bike gangs
(Savage, 2014).
What aspects of media portrayals of children?
A Group of children had spotted a clown about 150 miles to the northeast in Winston Salem,
North California. Another Schoolboy had been chased by a Knife-Wielding clown had been
reported by media. The reports also said that the clowns are especially stalking or targeting
the children. Every story of staking of children had been overstated by media. Media created
an intense fear and evolved the exaggerated fears from perceived the evil doers. Hence, the
media has no evidence about the events (Bartholomew 2018).
How are the two interrelated in both the generation and perpetuation
of these stories?
In both the stories, media had published the reports without any evidence. In both
stories, the unnecessary panic had been created by the media (Savage, 2014). In both stories,
the situation has been exaggerated by the media. The youth in the first had been presented as
evil and in the second story, the clown has been made evil by the media. Imagination stories
had been made in both the stories about the situation that has no evidence. It has created the
intense fear from among the evildoers (Stott, 2012).

CRIME IN MEDIA 1
References
Bartholomew, R. (2018). Clown Panic! Sightings of Mysterious Clowns Rattle Nerves In
South Carolina. Retrieved from: https://www.skeptic.com/reading_room/south-
carolina-clown-panics/
Savage, J. (2014). Mods v Rockers: Two tribes go to War. Retrieved from:
http://www.bbc.com/culture/story/20140515-when-two-tribes-went-to-war
Stott, A. (2012). Clowns on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown. The Journal for Early
Modern Cultural Studies, 12(4)