The Media's Construction and Focus on Victims

In 2005, an 18 year old girl was brutally bashed, doused in petrol and left for dead in her Northmead home. Only a beast could do this.

Lauren Huxley before she
was attacked

This was how the case on 18 year old Lauren Huxley, a victim of a horrendous criminal act, was told across the nation. I still recall hearing this on the news, and being freaked out because it happened so close to my Aunt and Uncle's house in Northmead. I remember the reporters kept mentioning how this was such a tragic and lamentable event to happen to someone so young and beautiful, and I remember thinking: "what does how beautiful she is got to do with anything?"
It now makes sense.
When the media report crime stories they are out to draw you in from the first line you read. Any crime report you read will be so full of strong emotive language, ultimately shaping your opinions of the victim(s) and offender(s). I know the example of Lauren Huxley is not a recent one, but it's one that has stuck with me because of the way it was reported. Looking at the articles regarding Lauren Huxley's ordeal on thedailytelegraph.com, when they focus on her victimisation you'll read lines like: "endured more pain than anyone will ever know", "brain had been so severely traumatised from a violent beating at the hands of a stranger", "fighting for her life", "beautiful Sydney teenager". The media invoke such sympathy, making Huxley out to be the stereotypical and deserving victim. If lines like the above don't make your heart go out to her (as they should) then I don't know what will.

Jewkes (2004) lists twelve key news values that can shape and ultimately sell crime news story. These are: threshold, predictability, simplification, individualism, risk, sex, celebrity or high-status person, proximity, violence, spectacle or graphic imagery, children, and conservative ideology and political diversion.Huxley's case, and news reports contain these key news values:

• Threshold - meets a certain level of perceived importance
• Predictability - an unexpected and rare event
• Individualism - regarding an individual
• Proximity - close to home
• Violence - speaks for itself
• Spectacle or graphic imagery - again, speaks for itself. Click here

Without  having gone into too much detail, the case of Huxley contains half of these values, making it in Jewkes opinion 'newsworthy'.

We've looked at how the victim was portrayed, so I thought I'd give a very brief account of how the media portays offenders in cases such as Lauren Huxley's: Robert Farmer, is described as 'monstrous', 'sickening', 'callous', 'evil, a 'beast'; when the media wants you to hate someone, you'll wish they were dead. That's the power of the media.

References:

The Daily Telegraph <http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/indepth/lauren-huxley>

Jewkes, Y., 2004, Media and crime, Sage, London.

RE: "The media coverage of school yard bullying"

In Katie Myer's blog post "The media coverage of school yard bullying" she looked at the media's coverage of school bullying using the example of Casey Heynes (who now has a tribute website), and how it has created a 'moral panic' regarding this issue of bullying. I however do not wish to respond to this, rather I'd prefer to reiterate it by looking further at the moral panic of bullying.

Anything that concerns the safety of children is always going to attract a lot of attention, so it makes sense that when the media report on bullying that there would be a public outcry. Yet it seems that this moral panic is a capricious one, whilst not denying the excess to which bullying occurs, due to its hidden nature bullying generally flies under the media's radar, and it is only when something extreme or especially dramatic occurs that this moral panic arises (Cohen 2002).  The video of Casey Heynes and his tormentor is a perfect example of this as it is right in the face of the public. Other examples of bullying creating a public fear off the top of my head are the Columbine Massacres, or the bullying related suicides of Alex Wildman or Hope Witsell, all of which spurned on a the outcry, as Katie stated, that bullying is on the rise and that school is no longer a safe place for our children. It seems though the media has no factual evidence of such, and are just using these extreme cases to  coerce us into believing it's a far greater concern and danger than what it really is. Ultimately what is happening is these extreme cases are creating a cognitive shift from "'how could it happen in a place like this?' to 'it could happen anyplace'" (Cohen 2002, p. xiii.

For the second half of this blog I'd like to make mention of the link Alyce posted in her comment on Katie's blog. The link is to a Media Watch piece about the Casey Heynes saga, where Media Watch discuss and pull apart the reporting methods and tactic used by ACA (A Current Affari) and TT (Today Tonight). I hadn't though much of it, but after watching this video I was appalled by how these reporter had invaded the lives of these kids, prodding them and asking for intimate details, just to milk their story without even or concealing their names or faces.

I don't like to say it, but it's times like this I feel the media are criminal.


References:

Cohen, S., 2003, Folk devils and moral panics : the creation of the mods and rockers, 3rd edn, Routledge, New York.

Crime and Media in the NSW State Election

When it comes to election time, I’m the sort of person who will go to extreme lengths to avoid having anything to do with it. There’s normally always a day or so when I contemplate paying the fine instead of voting (money always wins though). However, I’ve never tried looking at the election from a criminologist perspective, or even just looked at the crime aspect of the electoral debate. I was surprised to find that crime – or rather the prevention of it – seems to play a prominent in the whole process, potentially even deciding outcome.
Kristina Keneally (former Premier) and Barry O’Farrell (then Opposition Leader, now Premier) both utilised promises of a stronger Police Force for NSW: O’Farrell promising around 550 new officers, an extra 100 new highway patrol, new cars and even a new counter-terrorism helicopter, while Keneally making plans to only add an addition 360 extra police officers. However Keneally also stated that she planned on setting up a permanent unit to target criminal activity in motorcycle gangs, along with a new drive-by shooting offence for aimed at criminals who fire at buildings with children inside.

It seems they try to use the fear of crime and the need to be safe to aid their campaigns. O’Farrel was quoted saying; "Nothing's more important for any community than safety, safe communities are what parents, what individuals seek across this state” and "We want to support police by extra powers, we want to also support communities, by ensuring there are sufficient police available to do the job the community always seeks them to do." I feel that playing on the community fears, while a bit iffy is a clever tactic. I’d vote for someone who was going to protect me (if only I had done my research before voting!)

After having just done my CRIM2020 court report I was interested to read that both parties were promising a new drug court in Sydney, although Keneally only seemed to be trying to match the stakes O’Farrell set. They both made claims about ‘breaking the offender's dependence on drugs’ and helping them break the drug crime cycle and reduce the overall rates of offending.'

While I’m aware there are many, many other deciding factors in an election, based solely on the crime aspect, O’Farrell offers a much better deal.
And look at that, he won. Coincidence?

Solving Crime through 'The Social Network'

One of the points that really stuck with me from Strath Gordon’s lecture was the Police’s use of social networking websites in investigations and gathering and dispersing information.
                Now you think it would be obvious as to where to look to find good information on the NSW Police Force’s use of social networking to help solve investigations and communicate to the community, yet for some reason I spent a relatively unproductive hour searching the net with very little to show, and then it clicked; the NSW Police Force facebook page. I know, genius, right?

I assumed that most of the posts would be the NSW Police talking themselves up, yet while some of them are, interestingly enough the majority of posts I saw on their Facebook page were notices regarding the Police’s ‘ongoing investigations’ into various crimes of a more serious nature, such as armed robbery, assault, arson and homicide. One of the posts that stood out most to me, however, was a release of CCTV footage of an unknown man who might be able to assist in an investigation (http://www.facebook.com/notes/nsw-police-force/unseen-cctv-footage-released-into-2008-sydney-cbd-death/10150158346741394). To me this seems like such a clever and efficient way to help gather information that could ultimately lead to the apprehension of an offender, but after reading some of the comments to this post by civilian Facebook users it seems that the majority of people only want to voice their opinion (which are mostly irrelevant) instead of actually helping the Police. Although, I did notice that people were posting tips for Police on their wall (Facebook wall), for example one person posted an area where he’d seen people using their phones whilst driving on numerous occasions, and another woman posted about facebook groups which were being used to harass young kids. I think the NSW Police having a Facebook page is a good move on their behalf, not only does it help them (and ultimately us) find suspects and offenders, but it also makes them much more accessible and seemingly ‘user friendly’ to the broader community.

I found a media release on the AFP site posted last year that was about a case that involved an organised child exploitation network that had be operating through Facebook in four different continents (I have a feeling either Strath or Alyce has mentioned this to us). The police, in their respective countries, were able to work with Facebook in identifying and arresting eleven people for this child exploitation network. There was a nice little quote at the end of the article, "One of our most effective strategies against Internet-facilitated child sexual abuse is cooperation. No single agency can deal with this crime in isolation. We continually work together with our partners to ensure the safety and security of children, regardless of where they live."

I’ve also heard (as I’m most of you have too) of the Police using YouTube to catch people out committing crimes. I remember hearing people being questioned and potentially even charged over a few videos showing people fighting... And I think also a guy who ran over a swan with a boat. Some people are just too clever.

All in all, my opinion is that the Police are taking the right step by using the sites to help in investigations. We are living in an ‘online’ society, and where society exists, there’s crime. In other words, crime has expanded into the cyber-space, and Police need to use the tools at hand to monitor and investigate crime and criminal activities.

Road Wars – Police in Reality TV

I was watching the Crime & Investigation channel today, and it was showing a British police reality program called ‘Road Wars’. Its premise was filming actual police patrols as the police engaged in chases, RBTs, calls to disturbances and checking out suspicious people around Britain. It was very much the same as any reality TV show that followed police in Australia or the US (although I do find it very hard to take people who speak in the Yorkshire accent very seriously).

A few things stood out to me whilst I was watching Road Wars;

1] That they seemed to be focusing heavily on possession of drugs, particularly cannabis, putting their foot down on what some see to be minor offenses that ‘don’t warrant police attention’. The feeling I got from watching it was that; yes it is an offense, and yes we will find you. I figure this is one way they target drugs and try to lower its usage...clever really.

2] The police seemed to be using their discretion by trying to help these trouble youths they found by offering them ways out if they’d cooperate and do things ‘the easy way’ (unfortunately most didn’t, but then again, it wouldn’t have been as entertaining if they did).

And 3] in a ‘high speed’ pursuit, you never see the offending driver escape. They always, always, get caught. Is this because in actual fact the police do always catch the offending driver, or do they just not want us to see them fail to catch the baddies? This also made me think of how this is the pretty much the complete opposite in most movies involving a police car chase. I can’t off the top of my head think of any movie where the pursued get caught by the police (I’m positive there are some though).

All in all, it seemed evident that the police do (and must) show themselves in a good light where they always catch the bad guy, are hard on all offenses, but are capable of using discretion. I know that if I saw the police as being unable to always apprehend the speeders, the car thieves, the drink drivers, the drug dealers, the brawlers and so on, I would lose faith our law enforcement, as I'm sure a lot of people would.

Consuming Crime through the Media

Since starting uni, and moving into college, my level of media exposure has somewhat lessened to the point that it's a rare (and joyous) occasion when I get to see a TV program, hear a radio or read a news paper (it took me a while last year to realize we had a new Prime Minister). In saying this however, on the occasions when I  visit home I jump on the internet and download shows such as Bones, Fringe and Dexter to get my crime fiction fix. Got to watch my stories.
And while this may seem like living in a bubble of sorts, the massive scope of the media's ability to disseminate information to the masses through multiple mediums means that regardless of my personal lack of media consumption, the bigger/important news stories always find their way to me.
This is really one of the main points I want to make with this post; that the media is so viral, so encompassing to our modern society that even should you have minimal access, or for some reason be avoiding it, you'd be hard pressed to actually escape it's reaches.
Were it not for the media, my understanding of crime, criminals and the workings of justice would be naught (well maybe not naught). And personally, the depiction of crime through the media, especially in fictitious shows and news stories is what has ultimately shaped my own sense of justice and lead me to doing this course!