ESSAY : HOW DO MORAL PANICS FORM A FRAGMENT OF CULTURE?

Before we can fully assess moral panics in relation to culture, we must define what culture is. Culture is the preferred values favoured by a certain group. A moral panic will usually help form a fragment of a culture because they share the same values as others.

In terms of our case studies, we can see a clear borderline of Culture and Moral Panic, and this can especially be seen through the AIDS and paedophilia. We can clearly see that through these, communities react to these panics in a phenomenal way. In terms of AIDS, the fact it was known as an 'Epidemic' depicts how strong public opinion must have been over the disease. The next step of this is to analyse the culture formed within. Homosexuals and drug addicts were attacked by the public - and culture could then be formed. Extreme Christians would have a true reason to express their religious ideals (as Homosexuality is against the Catholic faith in particular) and this then became a fragment of their culture. The AIDS then intermingled with existing phobias - Homophobia, and this again shows the effect moral panic has on culture. With the media spotlight on the pandemic, portraying homosexuals and drug-users in an incredibly negative light, its no wonder to see how the moral panic spread even more so. Homosexuals and drug-users became folk devils and normal and religious propaganda attacked them even more so. This obviously worsens moral panic, especially to those uneducated to the subject, as most people were twenty years ago. But with the development of science, came the revelation that all could gain the disease and this lessened the media spotlight, and although it is incredibly well known that all can become infected, especially seen in third world countries, it still is often used as a form of abuse to homosexuals and bisexuals.

In our second case study about paedophilia , we can see how moral panics create fragmentations of culture in a different way. Whilst AIDS became moral panic through physical actions and demonisation, we could say that Child Abuse in families was created more passively, in the aspect that although the paedophiles were dehumanised and aggressively attacked, like homosexuals and drug-users, the main cause of action was through communities working (such as campaigns) together to solve the problem. This is highly contrasting to the AIDS epidemic and shows the differences in the forming of culture. A brilliant example of this forming of culture is through the abduction and unfortunate death of Sarah Payne. Here we can see the entire nation working to gain justice through the tragic events. This can be seen today - fourteen acts of legislation from 'Sarahs Law' have been pushed to date. This shows how a community when pulling together to achieve a sense of justice. This act was heavily supported by the newspaper, News of the World and shows how the medium truly is the message, as more support was gathered through the story. This shows how culture can be formed through the media and moral panics can largely affect a huge variety of people.

Through these case studies, we can gather how the audience reacts to the media; whether its through newspapers, propaganda or other platforms, positively and negatively, and the affect it has on the audience, and those being attacked. Moral Panic affects the media as well as the audience, and this creates the fragment of culture in some ways because the media broadcasts the message and either gives it its support or attacks it. The shared values of many people can then be placed into the spectrum as it is these people who listen to and are influenced by the media, showing how important the media is to forming fragments of culture. Also the very fact that people share these ideals, could arguably be another reason for creating a culture in the first place.

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