"The media do not construct collective identity; they merely reflect it" Discuss.

The idea of reflecting collective identity suggests the media give us, as the audience the 'bare facts' which in most cases especially when it comes to the representation of Youth is not being seen. The modern view on youth is that of 'thuggish, animalistic and violent' because of the media 'reflecting' their collective identity?

Reflecting also known as 'bare facts' and Construction can be seen as exaggerating the truth. When it comes to youth representation the media do not reflect yet construct their idea of what the youth of today are. Tabloid papers are famous for their headlines, in the recent London Riots headlines such as 'Riot yobs can't hide' shows they are constructing what they think and therefore want us to think. In broadsheets they are seen to reflect the news more than tabloids, there headlines are less extreme such as they will simply say what is happening , in the telegraph a headline on the news of the tuition fees was ‘Students protest over tuition fees’ and they tend to focus on what has happened in the articles.

Although, in all its different forms whether it being a tabloid newspaper or a broadsheet their job is too sell news and bad news sells. The idea of media constructing collective identity relates to the idea of moral panics. The media are said to create a moral panic, which is defined as a feeling expressed in a population about an issue reported by news which threatens society. A recent example of the media creating a moral panic about youth was the recent London Riots where the newspapers had headlines such as “British youths are the most unpleasant and violent in the world” the use of the words and the phrase ‘in the world’ is an exaggeration as they are talking in global terms, with the images alongside the headlines used of shops on fire and being looted by hooded youths further emphasis this message of ‘yobs and thugs’ therefore creating a moral panic as people reading and seeing these images especially of an older generation will feel scared and worry that all teenagers are involved in the riots and are violent when this isn’t the case. In a majority of the articles about the riots no other groups were mentioned expect youth or if they were it was brief which suggests that the sole focus was on the negative representation.

The Postmodernist theory can be related to the construction of collective identity because the idea of the emergence of new media and its connection with youth. Throughout the riots black berry messenger and Facebook were used constantly to relay messages to other rioters and pictures of stolen goods and the damage caused were posted. The idea of a social order being the media governs our society and by it creating these moral panics and relaying news to us 24/7 we will believe what they tell us. They create a construction of reality which we live in and accept. The media is inescapable and to an older generation reading about these ‘yobs’ and ‘thugs’ it would scare them and their overall view would be that of youth. This is also similar to the Marxist view on the media as they believe it is the hegemony and what the media tells us we believe because it is the dominant force in society.

Although there is the idea that we as an audience aren’t passive but active and interpret what the media say and make our own minds up. This relates to Stuart Hall’s encoding and decoding theory, he believes that the message is not transparent and the audience are not a passive participant. We can make up our own minds about what we think. For example with the recent tuition fee’s protests people certain footage and words in headlines were chosen for effect and to sell but as an active audience we could determine whether we believed all youths were like this and able to see past it.

In conclusion, the media does not reflect a constructive identity of youth in any form it merely constructs it for the purpose to sell. The words chosen in headlines and the images are to portray the dominant ideology in society of a negative portrayal of youth in today’s society and to create a sense of fear and moral panics to make society feel threatened. The hegemony is that of a negative image of youth, whether it is a tabloid paper or a broadsheet there purpose is too sell and bad news sells. Although also to be taken into consideration not all members of an audience are passive, many are active and will interpret messages for themselves. The media is inescapable and creates a sense of reality which we accept and live in. Everything in news is constructed because it has to be considered newsworthy and chosen which further emphasises the idea of the media constructing a collective identity.