Computer games are a prime example of media panic.
The term "media panic" was coined by Danish media scholar Kirsten Drotner.[1] Media panic refers to the highly emotionally charged discourse surrounding the emergence of new medium or media technology, such as the Internet, the World Wide Web, computer games or social media (which assume the role of folk devils),[2] that is feared threaten society and its values. It can be considered a specification of the wider concept of "moral panic" and according to Drotner follows several basic characteristics:[1]
The media is both the initiator and disseminator of the discussion.
The discussion is highly emotionally charged and morally polarizing (the medium either 'good' or 'bad'), those who oppose it tend to be the most vocal.
Concerns tend to centre around potential effects on children and the young and their perceived vulnerability to its influence (mass media bias).
Advocates ('moral entrepreneurs') tend to be representatives of certain groups (religious, professional, political, socio-economic) and have vested interests in the discussion, often deliberately framing youth as victims.[3]
According to John Springhall, media panics are often not strictly concerned by the nature of juvenile misbehaviour but instead become scapegoats for more general adult anxieties – fear of the future, of technological change and the erosion of moral absolutes. "Attacks on the influence of the media thereby act to conceal social uncertainties."[4]
^ abDrotner, K. (1998). Youth culture and the media: Unraveling of selected adult fears. In D. Buckingham (Ed.), Teaching popular culture: Beyond radical pedagogy (pp. 83–109). UCL Press.
^Cohen, S. (2011). Folk devils and moral panics (1st ed.). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203828250
^Buckingham, D. (Ed.). (1998). Teaching popular culture: Beyond radical pedagogy. UCL Press.
^Springhall, J. (1998). The Genesis of Media Panic: Discourse on Juvenile Delinquency in Britain, 1945–60. Macmillan.
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