The main job of the media is to make interesting stories and articles so the public will want to buy their newspaper to make money. So how do they make their stories interesting? Well they can do this one of two ways, they can either portray the public services to be heroic and how good of a job they are doing or they can put the public services in a bad light and only mention the things which they did were wrong. They could do this by getting the public’s opinion and revolve their story around what the public feels about a particular situation. Having controversial, funny and scandalous stories is what makes the news.
On Friday the 30th March 2012 Scotland Yard faced a racism scandal after a black man used his mobile phone to record police officers subjecting him to a tirade of abuse in which he was told: "The problem with you is you will always be a nigger".
In the video it shows a recording of the event which
one of the men took and it reveals the abuse which the Police officers gave to
the men. Obviously what was said was not acceptable and is discriminative and
police brutality but what we need to look at is how the media put this across
and what the public’s perception of the public services. From the story alone
it will put a bad light on the public services but how the Guardian newspaper
put the story across was condescending. They got reports from the men who were
the victims to the police brutality, a director of the Newham Monitoring
Project and solicitors of the victims. This shows in my opinion that public
perceptions of the public services will be negative and respect will be lost
due to the event. Having first-hand accounts of events will help the media put
across the story they want to put across. The evidence gives the media more
proof to their story and will help the media persuading the public to believe
the story. In this case study it is hard to have a side of the police officers
to defend their case since the evidence is very reliable but the question of
the matter is would the story be different if there was no recording of the event
or if the victims were ethnic minorities. In my opinion no. I believe this
because as I said earlier news can only be news if it is bad or controversial.
If the men were arrested and no abuse or brutality was used it would not be
made such a big deal about and wouldn’t be a talking point to the public
because not all arrests made by the police are plastered over the internet but
when the story is ‘saucy’ it will be. Negative and condescending stories
towards public services and organisations will always be the highlight of the
news. Positive points to an event will never be portrayed as much as the
negatives. From the case study used there are no positives to images given to
the public services in this. As said earlier it could be due to the fact there
is major evidence to give negative images but other stories such as the G20
riots and the recent London riots BBC news and other media companies gave only
the negative points to the riots and they were mainly from the view of those
who were injured or been ‘attacked’ by the riot police involved.
So using events like the ones I have used above its
hard to think the media give a good light on the public services, but the
public services get in the media other ways as well. Using public health and
informational campaigns such as drink driving, Crimewatch, and press
conferences can help put a good light on the public services. Harrogate news
did a drink drive campaign in 2011 for the Christmas period. In the article
they gave information about the campaign, how many arrested had been made, and
how many had been breath tested. From a personal point of view this a good way
for the public services having a good light by informing the public what they
are doing to prevent deaths and incidents caused due to drink driving. This
really has no negative images against the public services. But this might make
the public weary of the public services because they would worry about if they
are going to be stopped for a breath test and may take into consideration about
taking the risk with breaking the law by drink driving or how much they drank
the night before.
As an overall sum up of whether or not the media gives
positive or negative images to change the perception of the public towards the
public services is that it depends on what story or information the media gives
about a story or an event. If the story involves police brutality or where
people are injured due to the police the perception of the public on the public
services is going to be negative and if the stories or information help the
public like with drink drive campaigns it will give a positive perception.
Story by Jonathan Benton
Resources: Matthew Allison, Tom Purling, Ryan
Hall-Galley
Editor: Ben Browne
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