The media plays a key role in how the members of the public stay informed of the events that affect them directly or indirectly. Mass media has become an essential part of the entire public with many people remaining dependent on it for any event around the world. Different types of mass media report on the different news. The newspapers, for example, mainly report on major national and local news. However, in case there is a major international story, the newspaper will cover it even if not in so much detail. The television covers all types of news from local, national to international. The digital sources of news such as the social media and news websites (BBC) cover news from around the world as well. People use media differently depending on accessibility and the characteristics of the media. This critical and reflective essay will focus on my own usage of the different media and its influence on my understanding of.
My media consumption over 25th-27th
January 2018
Media Type
Crimes
Newspapers
Television News
Social Media
Websites
Rape
Knife crime (stabbing)
Hate Crimes
Time spent
Less than 1 hour per day
Approximately 2 hours per day
Approximately 5 hours per day
Approximately 3 hours per day
Most common media
Most Common stories
Method of coverage
Poor
Fair
Well
The results from the above graph show that I mainly focus on social media and websites to access my news. From my analysis, it is clear that I am very choosy on the type of media that I access crime news. I want instant news as they happen, instead of waiting for over 12 hours to receive the news on any other media. Further, I like to authenticate the news I receive on the different digital media. Fake news can spread just as quickly as the real news, and thus it is important to thorough to ensure that the news on the social media is true. Before the internet, people were more dependent on newspapers and television to access news. However, in the contemporary world, more people depend on social media and websites. My usage has also changed, I grew up in an era where my parents depended more on the television for news. I was not very keen on following the news but crime news sparked an interest in me. Today, I am more dependent on social media for any type of news including crime news. Social media is the “normal” for me because I depend on it on any type of news around the world. Research has shown that most people including the older generation are embracing social media as their news source (Wakefield 2016). The digital media is the main source for my news followed by websites and blogs.
Social media sources provide news from around the world instantly (Wakefield 2016). With social media, it is easy to know what is happening in any part of the world at any given time (Wakefield 2016). There is a constant update of information from many avenues. Further, many television and newspapers put their entire news on their social media pages (Wakefield 2016). In regards, to this, one does not need to wait until the next day to read a newspaper on the news that happened the previous day. Further, before the media gets to the scene of the crime, social media has already posted videos and pictures of the same. This has been made easier because the majority of the populations around the world today own mobile phones with cameras and video recorders, which make it easy to alert the world on the happenings around them instantly they happen (Wakefield 2016). Sometimes, there is the question of the authenticity of the social media news. For this reason, I depend on certified company pages on social media, such as BBC and CNN to authenticate the news. This is easy to do because the pages are always updating their news all through the day 24/7. My preference for social media is due to the instant news, anytime, anywhere.
Part 2
The selected story for this essay is the case of a 16-year old teenager (Abdulrahman Ali) who stabbed his friend to death in a Snapchat emoji row, who was sentenced to 15 years in prison (Pennick 2018). This case is important because there has been a rise in the number of knife crimes. According to Travis (2018), stabbing deaths hit an eight-year high among young people in 2018. The criminological theory explains why different types of crimes happen. Experts have tried explaining the reason why people engage in stabbing crimes. Most of the stabbing crimes happen among teenagers as in the selected case. Many young people believe they should carry knives to protect themselves (Gliga 2009). Many young people have been labelled as “at-risk” population of crimes. Carrying a knife with them ensures they are not victimized or attacked. The young people have been conditioned to think that they are at risk and thus need to be ready to protect themselves at any time. There is popularity as well among the young people of carrying knives so that their peers can respect and accept them. In the case of the 16-year old teenager, there was a fight about who among the two was stronger. The offender decided to show that he was stronger by stabbing his friend. Gliga (2009) notes that violence is mostly a decision-making that does not take into consideration the long-term effects of the actions but rather the immediate effects. Ali decided to act and show that he was the stronger one without thinking of the consequences (Pennick 2018). Gliga (2009) also notes that the media plays an important part in encouraging violent behaviour among the young people.
During the three days, there were other stories covered. These stories mostly involved knife crimes following the release of a report of an increase of these crimes. Apart from stabbing, there was an increase in the number of knifepoint rape. Further, rape cases also increased. However, these cases were not covered in a comprehensive way as would be expected. Most of the media outlets just report on the story and do not bother to add follow up details about the crimes. The rape crimes are rarely reported in the social media, unlike the stabbing cases. The knife crimes are labelled as hate crimes, which might lead to the media providing more details. Despite the prominence of rape crimes, they rarely go viral. Majority of the people may not be bothered because it affects a certain population.
The news article prioritises some news values. One of the main news values is violence. The act of fatally stabbing a friend because of a game is reported with excitement and drama among the audience. Another news value prioritised is children. The news piece focus is a murder committed by a minor, which makes it an interesting story to cover. As aforementioned, there has a rise in the knife stabbing crimes over the past few years. The predictability of this crime is high, which makes it a newsworthy story. These three news values are common in crime news as depicted in the case above.
The length and sources used in the story fails to show any prioritisation. The police and notes from the court proceeding were mainly used in the story. With digital sources, a problem with space forces many news media to avoid being lengthy. The story entails the important parts of the story without going into too much detail. This is unlike the newspapers, whereby there is the provision of more details about any story. The sources and length of the story show that there the story was not prioritised as it should be.
The digital media is taking over the newspapers and televisions. Most of these avenues have moved to digital avenues. Young people use the social media to gather and spread the news. In the contemporary world, it is easy to find more crime stories on social media and blogs than in the mainstream media. Like many other young people, I mostly depend on social media and news websites to acquire news. However, there is lack of comprehensive news coverage by single entities. This means that one has to use more sites to gather enough information about any news story uncovered through digital media. However, the speed through which news stories diffuse through the social media makes it easy to get information on interesting crime stories.
References
Gliga, T. 2009.
The ‘Knife Crime’ phenomenon- A Psychological perspective on youth crime culture Centre for Brain and Cognitive Development. BPS Parliamentary Office.
Pennick, E. 2018. Teenager who murdered friend with MEAT CLEAVER in Snapchat emoji row is jailed as judge lifts ban on naming him. Mirror. Online]. Available at: https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/teenager-who-murdered-friend-meat-11916853, Accessed 10 Feb. 2018.
Travis, A. 2018. Stabbing deaths among young people hit eight-year high. The Guardian. [Online]. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/feb/08/stabbing-deaths-among-young-people-england-wales-eight-year-high, Accessed 10 Feb. 2018.
Wakefield, J. 2016. Social media “outstrips TV” as news source for young people. BBC. [Online]. Available at: http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-36528256, Accessed 10 Feb. 2018.
