Week 2
Moral Panic

Moral panic is like a threat to societal values and interests. They often happen when society has been incapable to adjust to notable changes and when such change guide to a fear of a loss control within the normal social structure.

During the 1960s, society experienced such modernising trends called “sexual revolution”. When events like those in 1960s occur there is a worry that the whole generations can sometimes be charged of undermining society’s moral structure.  Mostly young people have often been seen as immoral and threatening to the accepted norms and patterns found through our culture. Rock n’ Roll music during 1950s and 1960s was extensive anxiety because of fears that it led to anti – social behaviour and licentiousness.

The 1960s generation was called ‘drug culture’ and was believed that an entire generation would become ‘crazed’ addicts. Many pop stars who were apprehend as having a high influence to the youth of the day were led to persecution.

According to reading : Microphone Friends, Youth music & Youth Culture

‘Moral panic is a metaphor which describes a complex society as an individual who experiences sudden groundless fear about its virtuousness. Although the term serves the purposes of the record industry and the music press well by inflating the threat posed by subcultures as an academic concept, its anthropomorphism and totalization mystifies more than it reveals.  Popular music is in perpetual search of significance. 

Association with sex, death and drugs imbue it with a ‘real life’ gravity that moves it beyond lightweight entertainment into the realm of at the very least serious hedonism.  Acid house came to be hailed as a movement bigger than punk and akin to the hippie revolution precisely because its drug connections made it newsworthy beyond the confines of youth culture. Disparaging media coverage is not the verdict but the vehicle of their resistance.’

Rose, T. and Ross, A. 1994. Microphone friends. New York [u.a.]: Routledge.

Moral Panic example:

Ozzy Obsourne is an English rock artist, songwriter and television personality.

In 1984 California teenager John Mc Collum committed suicide during listening to  ‘Suicide Solution’. The song deals with the dangers of alcohol abuse. Teenager’s suicide led to contentions that Obsourne promoted suicide in his songs. Despite knowing that the boy suffered clinical depression, his parents sued Obsourne for their son’s death claiming the lyrics in the song ‘Where to hide, suicide is the only way out . Don’t you know what it’s really about?’ made the boy to commit suicide. Some parental groups and minister started asserting had a backwards or hidden message saying ‘Shoot, Shoot’. But the real meaning of the song is very misunderstood; it is an anti-drinking song and has nothing to do with suicides. 

Throughout his career, Christian groups have accused Obsourne of being a bad influence on teenagers claiming that rock music has been used to glorify Satanism. Obsourne firmly denies the charge of being a Satanist; also he said the he is a member of the Church of England and that he prays before taking the stage each night before every concert.

References :

·         Aber.ac.uk. 2014. Moral Panics. [online] Available at: http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Students/mtw9403.html

·         Rose, T. and Ross, A. 1994. Microphone friends. New York [u.a.]: Routledge.

·         Wikipedia. 2014. Ozzy Osbourne. [online] Available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ozzy_Osbourne