Moral Panic: Teenage Crime

Moral Panic

Moral panic is when the feeling of anxiety is expressed in a population, which could be locally, nationally or internationally. Moral panic usually occurs when there is an issue that threatens current society - for example the recession.

Moral panic is caused by an increase in negative media coverage. This usually happens when there has been a recent issue, and other past case studies are used to highlight the problem. It allows a large amount of people to hear about the information and pass it on - causing moral panic.

These are a few headlines from various news websites like the Telegraph, Daily Mail and the Huffington Post from either 2014 or 2015.

The moral panic related to teenagers can be reduced by not using demonising labels in newspaper articles i.e. Frenzied and Stab Death.

Although for these headlines to exist the crimes must be happening. To stop moral panic focusing on teenage crimes, headlines and articles could be published on parts of the site that get smaller interest, or controversially not published at all, which is what happened with the Stephen Lawrence trial.

The telegraph posted an article stating that are psychological reasons for certain teenagers to turn to crime. The headline being "Poor boys turned into criminals at school". The article later defined poor boys as "white boys eligible for free school meals".

In poorer regions of the United Kingdom, teachers are more likely to be less qualified at their jobs, with one teacher stating that "proper discipline belonged in the dark age".  Leading to students becoming less interested in learning and turning to other activities such as drinking and crime.

Even statistically the increase in moral panic over teenage crime doesn't make sense. The first graph shows that the number of guilty 18 to 20 year olds has decreased from 60,000 in 1999 to 45,000 in 10 years. 

The second graph shows that the number of arrests between the ages of 10 and 17 has reduced from 500 per 100,000 to less than 200 per 100,00 from 1992 to 2012.

Creating a public anxiety over an issue is a way of keeping the public safe, as it stops people becoming careless with their safety. By scaring the public, they are more likely to stay away from potentially dangerous places.

Another reason could also be to scare younger generations. By exposing them to teenagers with prison sentences, they are less likely to follow the same path and commit crimes. Although the increase in demonising labels aimed at teenagers, that aren't always true, make teenagers more likely to conform to the self-fulfilling prophecy.