Media's Responsibility for Turning the Kray Twins From Villains into Heroes

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Media's Responsibility for Turning the Kray Twins From Villains into Heroes

The title of this essay already assumes that the Kray Twins were

villains and that they were actually seen as heroes. Not all of the

sources say either, that the twins were villains, or that the Twins

were heroes, some are objective. It could be said that the question is

biased towards the twins.

The British media often represented the East End of London as a

somewhat 'glamorous' and 'trendy area'. Photographs, by David Bailey,

showed young men dressed in 'stylish suits', 'narrow ties' and

'stovepipe trousers'. These quotes come from source 3. Later in the

same source the author, Jones, the East End being one of the best and

most prominent settings for thrillers and novels on which to be

written. He describes the 'evil' of the East End and its 'poverty

induced conditions' and how people lived their lives against a back

drop of 'drunkenness, immortality, 'rape' and 'assault' and how gangs

often ruled the streets. In a way Jones is trying to make acceptance

of the Krays behaviour because of their background, and because of the

conditions in which they were brought up and the people who they mixed

with, these were good enough excuses for the crimes, which they

committed.

Another source that suggests the media glamorised the Krays is source

4. It shows the promotional front cover of the video of the film 'The

Krays'. The cover shows Gary Kemp, who played Ronnie Kray holding a

gun. Where the contents of the film are rated it suggests that there

is 'violence' and 'strong sexual content' in the film. Both these

factors send out strong brutal messages about ...

... middle of paper ...

...er…would have been

hanged', a completely different opinion from source 3 'the heaviest

prison sentence ever handed down by a British court of law'.

Referring back to the question, most of the sources do suggest that

that the media were responsible sensationalising crime, in general.

There are certain sources, which certainly do glamorise the

environment of the Krays. It shows what a 'sheddy' place they were

surrounded by and the kind of people who lived around them source 3

really shows this. The Krays themselves were involved a lot in making

themselves celebrities and publicising their criminal activity, they

also had a way of manipulating the media into printing stories that

happened. The statement is an exaggeration of the truth, but the media

definitely played a part in advertising crime and making it 'trendy'.

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