WEEK 4 : Censorship, effects, and moral panics: what do the media do to people?

This week we learnt about censorship, effects and moral panics in media. The lecture covered moral panics, which mainly included the change of subcultures, which lead to ‘a widespread fear that deviants are attempting to destroy the fabric of society.’(Stanley Cohen) The lecture also covered censorship in media, such as regulations, which are rules set out to ensure that everything thats shown from films to television is regulated and safe, fair and sensitive. These rules ensured that (mostly) everybody was happy in what was being shown and made it safe for ‘everyone’ to watch and listen. One of the readings was by J Bignall who stated that ‘Broadcasting organisations are ultimately dependent on the Government’[1] (J Bignall 2004:231) which shows us that the Government always has the last say on what is shown, hopefully with our safety in thought instead of theirs.

Nelmes was one of the set readings, his mainly spoke about US censorship, however, he included some information about the UK too. He reveals that since 1952 in the US film has been protected under the first amendment, meaning that the government has full control of what is shown. Nelmes suggests that with a smaller audience because of set ratings ‘will this mean that the films with do less well commercially’[2] (Nelmes 1999:48), which suggests that sometimes film makers may alter their content to have a larger audience. Nelmes also mentions that ‘with the start of the second world war, the state took a direct role in film censorship’[3] (Nelmes 1999:52) because the government may have not wanted to risk war propaganda which would lead to fear and panic.

My own reading links to Nelmes’, as it also talks about censorship during the war. Karen Slattery believed that ‘Government propaganda and press censorship shaped the narrative of the ‘Good War’.[4] Karen Slattery (2012) Which meant that because the Government could censor everything it meant that what the audiences were seeing and hearing made the war look like it was a good thing and would have a positive effect on the country. Censorship also is approached in Slattery’s article by which she states that ‘by withholding some information from the public, the press put concerns about international crisis ahead of its professional devotion to the truth’[5] (Karen Slattery 2012) meaning that although the press had a moral code to tell the truth, in this case they did not as they viewed making the public believe the war was a good thing was a more important thing.

[1] Bignell, J (2004) An Introduction to Television Studies, London: Routledge. pp 229-252

[2] Nelmes, J (1999) An Introduction to Film Studies, 2nd Edition, London: Routledge. pp. 48-53

[3] Nelmes, J (1999) An Introduction to Film Studies, 2nd Edition, London: Routledge. pp. 48-53

[4] SLATTERY, K. and DOREMUS, M., 2012. Suppressing Allied Atrocity Stories: The Unwritten Clause of the World War II Censorship Code. Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly, 89(4), pp. 624-642.

[5] SLATTERY, K. and DOREMUS, M., 2012. Suppressing Allied Atrocity Stories: The Unwritten Clause of the World War II Censorship Code. Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly, 89(4), pp. 624-642.