Effects of Violence in the Media

Effects Of Violence In The Media

Television is the source of the most broadly shared images and messages in history; it is the mainstream of the common symbolic environment into which children are born and which has a major part to play in our lives. One can argue that media violence contribute towards social violence where the effects place a huge impact in ones being. Television violence is not only a form of media violence; there are other significant forms of media that contribute to media violence which are computer games, comic books and music. Television being the most popular form of media today, and held in almost every American household.

Violence is part of everyday life which the media reflects on. One can argue and say that violence in the media reflects on the society we live in, however violence has been around even before the existence of the media, it could be argued that the media might not be the root of the escalating violence in society but with studies and studies of effect the argument could be wrong. There have been numerous cases with media violence being repeated in real violence, a prime example, where two ten-year old boys, lead another boy away from his mother while she was not looking in a shopping centre, the boys had brutally abused this other child which eventually led to his death. Although the event was shocking, leaving people in disbelieve and confused of how the children could be influenced to doing such, looking at their family history/background is essential as it could have triggered their behavior. It was said that they had come from a family with a history of 'abuse and hardship'. However the media were to blame for this case, with the negative influence of popular culture, violent video games and films the boys were exposed to, the effects of the media would have played huge part in what had happened. Children are easily influenced by the negatives of the media. It was argued that the similarities between the events of a horror movie was to blame and the murder of the child were effectively non-existent, it was said that one of the boys might have seen the film which could have corrupted and poisoned his mind leading him to commit such crime. "A study found that 93% of students that live in urban or rural areas have regular access to television and watch it for an average of three hours a day. This is 50% more than the time spent on any other out of school activity".(violence exposure).This extract taking from Moving Images, describes movie content, it also best describes that media violence exerts a powerful damaging influence on young people's minds and mould them into what the media has portrayed there are many factors to take into consideration but at such a young a child's mind is easily transfixed into believing in what is not real or practical.

Screen violence clearly appeals to popular concerns and is never