Moral Panic Model

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Recently, a group known as the Apex gang, consisting of young, mostly Sudanese males based in Melbourne's southern suburbs, were believed to have incited a brawl with another gang in the Melbourne CBD on the night of Saturday the 12th of March during the 2016 Moomba Festival (Lillebuen 2016). Since the brawl the group have also been linked to a spike in car-thefts and home invasions across Melbourne (Lillebuen 2016). This essay will attempt to examine the recent media response to the Apex gang using the moral panic model. Given the limited research into the specific media response to the Apex gang, this essay will compare current examples of headlines and stories in the media devoted to the supposed threat of gang violence in Melbourne, with …show more content…

xxiii). It can be argued that these functions are evident in the media’s coverage of the Apex gang’s activities since the Moomba riot which has increased, with multiple media sources reporting on recent car-thefts and home invasions keeping the issue in the public attention, while also enlisting claims-makers such as members of Victoria police to give statements on the seriousness of the issue, and subsequently having individuals at media outlets express their opinions on the measures that should be taken to control the threat of youth gangs (Lillbuen 2016; Mills & Houston 2016; Silvester 2016). In these ways, the media can be said to perpetuate moral panics. In conclusion, this essay has discussed the media’s response to the recent issue of youth-related gangs in Melbourne, through the utilisation of the moral panic model. Goode & Ben-Yehuda’s five elements of moral panic were applied to analyse the recent media response to youth gangs in Melbourne, and compared to the media attention devoted to gangs in previous years. The functions of the media in facilitating moral panics were also discussed in order to justify the reasons why the current response of the media can be classified as a moral

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