Press Representations

Teen Trouble (2007)

12% of offenders under the age of 18
Adults think teenagers are the single biggest threat
Teenagers chose around 10-20%
Media 'their to entertain' .. negative story gets a bigger reception than a positive one
'teens out of control' makes a good story
police think 95% of the time, youths are just hanging around not causing trouble
Mosquito- sends out a noise only teenagers can hear
Police can break up a group of 2 or more on dispersal orders and if they are seen together in the next 24 hours they will get arrested
Real life case Kerry has been blasted in the newspapers for having an ASBO. She has been called 'foul mouthed' and 'teen terror chav scum'
There has been cases where the press have paid youths to make some trouble so that they can report about it
Jamie Bulger case changed the way police viewed children
culural hegemony
cultivation theory - the amount of proliferation of press coverage means that people are more likely to believe its happening in real life, in turn creates moral panic
hypodermic syringe theory - we are passive and are 'injected' by the media and we believe everything that we are injected with, particularly old people
Stewart halls different readings - encoded
youths become desensitisation


CCTV vindicated for saving the day
4.2 million CCTV cameras in the country
young people caught on camera, turn on tv and see antisocial behaviour happening
Knife crime
6% more likely to get injured falling down stairs then getting stabbed


40% of articles focus on violence, crime, anti-social behaviour, 71% are negative
Tv news: Violent crime or celebrities; young people are only 1% of sources
72% of articles were negative; 3.4% positive
75% about crime, drugs, police
Boys; yobs, thugs, sick, feral, hoodies, louts and scum
Only positive stories are about the boys who die young

When TV was covering the riots on a round-the-clock basis, it seemed as always with roling news that they desperately trying to talk about it all the time. Looked for experts, community leaders called to condem the rioters

What role did new media technologies, particularly social networking sites, play in the london riots?

Do media cause riots or revolutions? Campaigns, riots that happened in Egypt

Technology and surveillance: mobile phones, CCTV, 24- hour news