Week Two Blog

Hayward's article called 'opening the lens' posed that while we may not experience criminal activity in our everyday life, we are bombarded with images of crime through different media outlets (Television, Movies, radio, internet, newsprint, etc). The notion of the 'image' and 'visual' being interchangeable as well as different to the viewer 'seeing' or taking in that image of crime has an impact on how our society perceives crime and criminal justice in our world. Our views in turn shape the image that we see and it becomes a cyclical process between the impact of the image on the viewer and the impact of the viewer on the image. I agree with Hayward's ideas and methodological approach to studying cultural criminology in the media and the idea that " the (visual) media has changed from simply conveying information or telling entertaining stories about crime, to actually shaping and producing its reality." I think that crime-related media might be more influential on our culture and society than we perceive in our everyday experiences.

There were different methodological approaches discussed for studying crime in Yar's article. The Content Analysis approach looks at the frequency of a particular image, word, or phrases within a medium across different media. This is a very objective approach to studying crime trends in the media which could produce some interesting results but doesn't quite give us the whole picture. I think this approach to studying crime is a surefire way to come up with some good numbers or facts, but doesn't look deep enough into the 'why' aspect of happenings in crime-related media. the Marxists approach to studying crime looks at how crime-related media is presented to society in such a way that reinforces the views of the most powerful people in society. Marxist ideology poses that the consumers views of this crime related media are being influenced by the dominant class interests and the views that they hold. This is a somewhat negative view on crime-related media and i don't completely agree with the notion that all crime-related media is a reflection of the dominant class in our society. The postmodern pluralism approach suggests that there can be multiple meanings derived from any single crime-related medium. i agree with this approach because every individual in society has their own subjective experience and i think you can have a host of different meanings from any TV show, movie, etc.

In Alison Young's article she suggests that when we are the consumers of crime related media, we are not simply just watching the Movie or TV show, but we are an active partaker in what is happening in the crime-related event. We are affected by what is happening in the scene and our perspective of crime can be shifted, shaped, and molded by the media. This suggests that the media has a certain power over how we think about crime and its relation to us and the society we live in. I agree with Young's methodological approach in studying crime in the media because it goes beyond simply just viewing crime, but she suggests that we are an active participant in it. We feel what the people feel, and relate to the images and stories portrayed on a human level. This suggests that criminal images and stories in the media can evoke a strong response in us.

The Law and Order viewing from last week is related to this weeks readings on many different levels. In some ways the different characters in the show are reinforcing the ideas of the societal view on crime and how things occur in the real world. The portrayals in a lot of these episodes are exaggerated or not completely accurate. We all know that how crime is presented in a Law and Order episode is not a completely accurate depiction of crime in the real world, but we still identify with the depictions represented of the police, law enforcement, victim, suspects, and the perpetrators. the script is somewhat predictable the more you watch the episodes. I also notice that these episodes evoke an emotional response in us, just like Alison Young discussed in her article about Movies emotional affect on us. I also think that postmodern pluralism can be applied to Law and Order episodes because not everyone will be affected in the same exact way. and you can get multiple meanings from these heinous crimes depicted in the episodes.

For my outside viewing this week, i decided to watch a crime-related movie called The Italian Job. I found this movie to be related to the post-modern pluralism ideology and Alison Youngs ideas about being an active viewer in the media and the affect it has on our emotions and perspectives. In the movie, there is a group of professional thieves who go on a trip to Italy to steel a bunch of gold. It turns out that after they got away with the gold, one of the men in their group has a hidden agenda and decides to steal all the gold for himself and shoot the group leader. His daughter finds out about loosing her father and wants retribution. One man in the group who was like an apprentice to the father decides to get everybody back together and steal the gold that was once theirs. They find the man who betrayed them in LA and come up with a plan to regain their prized gold. While i was watching this movie, I couldn't help but sympathize for the daughter who lost her father and was angry at the man who killed him and stole all the gold that should have been theirs. While watching this movie, you sympathize with the people getting the gold back, but after i watched it i realized that even the "good guys" were committing a crime too, but it was portrayed in a heroic manner. This shows how multiple meanings can be derived from this film, what we perceive as being right and wrong, event though the crime is wrong, it can be justified in some cases such as in this movie. I think that this shows the power of crime in the movies and how our views can be subtly changed in certain criminal situations and what is right and wrong. The lines can become blurred in this situation.