Violence In The Media

How does violence in the media affect the viewers?

For many years violence in the media has been a major issue. Some believe that being exposed to violence on television, gaming and other in other media can have a negative impact on the way we think and act regarding violence. In particular the media is said to have a greater impact on children and teenagers.

Although there is others who believe that violence is natural and does not affect the audience, various experiments and studies have been done to show what effect the media has on children but the argument is on going.

At the beginning of my study on violence I believed that violence did not have any affect on the viewer/listener, but I discovered that in my opinion violence does affect a very few amount of people in a negative way. After researching the case of Nathan Martinez, who became obsessed with hit movie ‘Natural Born Killers’ which resulted in him killing two family members, acting and dressing in the same way as the character Mickey in the movie, this seemed to be more than just an excuse for his behaviour but the true cause. But the question is should the fact that a very small amount of mentally unstable viewers stop the rest of us from watching anything violent?

As well as studying the case of Nathan Martinez I also studied popular children’s television programme ‘Power Rangers’, best selling video game ‘Grand Theft Auto’ and now retired rapper Eminem.

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The video game ‘Grand Theft Auto’ is a useful media product to analyse as the object of the game is to steal cars, join the mafia, use serious weapons and kill for a living. This is considered a problem as it is believed that this is teaching you how to act in a destructive and violent matter without you realising, it is also believed that the game puts the message across that this behaviour is an acceptable way to live your life, as the game glamorises the killing sprees and drug battles. However others that believe violence does not have a negative affect on the audience think that games such as ‘Grand Theft Auto’ are a healthy outlet for any built up anger in that person’s life, in particular teenagers. Surely shooting some one virtually is better than shooting some one in real life?

Television programme ‘Power Rangers’ aimed at children aged between age three and eight is considered by many as a bad influence to children. In the programme

A group of six friends morph into super heroes and beat up monsters and bad guys, this is considered a bad thing for children to be watching as they are easily influenced at that age, children also might believe that it is a cool thing to do and re-enact. But the opposing argument points out that the television characters only fight supernatural creatures, therefore it would be impossible for the child to be in the same circumstances and act in the same way.

Finally the last media product I think is important to analyse is rap music, it has always had a negative stigma particularly with the older generation. Retired rap singer song writer Eminem raps about his violent past drug abuse and other explicit subjects, subjects that are usually hidden away as if they don’t exist. People against violence being in the media believe that listening to such violent speaking about difficult serious situations will believe that violence is the way to deal with things, also listeners will think its ‘cool’ to get involved with drugs and violence. Although others especially fans of rap music believe that you listen to the music because you like that particular style, not because you think violence is a ‘cool.’ Also fans believe that listening to the music lets out any pent up frustration as the lyrics are about real life situations.

I also think it is important to recognise that violence is shown in a whole range of different material, ranging from the News to cartoons. Violence is not always shown as bloody gory violence, it can be subtle but still let us know what is happening. Violence is a part of life as we see mostly every night in the news at ten, the news shows us video footage and images from across the world featuring death and fighting. This does not mean it encourages us to be violent, it simply shows us what is happening in the world.

Overall, it is hard to determine how violence in the media affects us as every person reacts differently. Also for every argument showing a correlation between violence and acting in a violent manner there is an argument disagreeing. In my opinion many people use violence in the media as excuse for violent behaviour, when really there is an under lying problem.

I think the argument deciding if violence and violent behaviour have a relevant correlation will go on for a long time, as it is very hard to prove how some ones brain reacts to violence. Even if the link is proved, banning violence would have many disadvantages, for example we would no longer be able to see what is going on in wars across the world.

By Elaina Mowat