Teenagers in the Media

In the following Essay I will be explaining the representation of teenagers in the media, the research to this leads directly towards the documentary I will be producing, my pitch has featured examples directly from this essay and will build the base and core meaning behind my reasoning of the documentary.

In the media teenagers are represented as ‘thugs’ the stereotype generalising them is a media driven agenda that has snowballed into brainwashing the general public into believing this statement.

Initially in the Press media sector, the Demos research team analysed six different UK newspapers from 2004 to 2014 and the words used most with “teenagers” are ‘Binging, Yob and Crime.’ The word binging refers to binge drinking, driving the stereotype that all teenagers are drunken alcoholic psychopaths. Which obviously is not the case; although some teenagers do drink a majority do not, which does massively misinterpret the hobbies of teens.

Likewise with the Yob and Crime word association connotes that all teenagers are rebellious, anti establishment criminals, which is a huge massive representation. But this stereotype is still driven by the press because it only seems to report on negative, hard hitting news that puts teenagers into an area where the general public believe that teenagers are what the media perceive them as.

Moreover, two thirds of teenagers believe that these negative stereotypes are ruining their job prospects, with employers looking at more adult contenders because of these stereotypes driven by the press.

Race is also an agenda driven by the media especially in the newspapers. In 2010, 15 Year Old Teenager Jessie James was murdered in South Manchester and without any prior information or facts, the media lambasted Jessie, saying that he was asking for his attack. Due to his location, race and age. The media pushed an agenda to say that the reason for his attack was due to these characteristics of the young boy. In a Guardian article, Manchester is nick named ‘Gunchester.’ This pun is demeaning to the local community mainly in the area where his shooting occurred.

This shows a direct link that is being made by the media to young black teenagers and gun crime. The guardian article quotes ; Flip through the files on Manchester gun crime over the past 20 years and a pattern emerges: a shooting, usually of a young black man; "Gunchester" headlines; community dismay; complaints that there is little on offer for the young; announcements of regeneration; drops in gun crime, then a spate of shootings and the cycle starts again. While parts of Moss Side, Longsight and Hulme where the shootings have taken place have been refurbished, others are stagnant.”

A Negative stereotype against teenagers is also shown in the film industry. Starting with British made movie Attack the block. From just the trailer stereotypes are shown. The establishing shots depict an urban jungle in London presumably, the introduction of the characters shows them riding around on

Teenagers in the Media

bikes in hoodies, with caps balaclavas also in the mix. This is a common clothing stereotype of mischievous teenagers, and form the first encounter of these people this is what we are shown. First impressions mean a lot.

Later on in the trailer when the aliens begin to land. One of the gang at the back says “Im killing them, im killing them straight” to which his friend responds “lets get tooled up blud” and rolls up his sleeves to which then the camera shows the teenagers get all sorts of weapons on hand. This ideology shows that teenagers all have a plethora of weapons on hand ready to incite violence or threat. Further enforcing the yob and criminal stereotype. To further enforce this, later on someone asks “Who would want to invade south London?” to which one of the teenagers replies “ones who want a fight” This could infer that these teenagers are experienced with fighting before and that they would be up to put their experienced to the test against aliens. Likewise later on in the trailer one of the teenagers is using text to communicate with someone to which he says that hes only got one credit left, and what’s happening around him is too mad for just one text. This opitimises the teenage way of thinking, in that with the situation around them, they are more bothered about the credit left on their phone rather than the impending doom around him. This shows a different stereotype of modern teenagers, that they are so detached from the world around them that they are only so focused on their phones.

However this could be seen as a parody, with satire tones on teenagers roles. In that they aren’t a realistic representation but rather a satire take on teenagers as a whole. But the argument still remains due to these very blatant stereotypes. Although they do not break any laws or regulations. Albeit it may be just an unethical issue; with showing teenagers in a bad light, which seems to be a big trend, is just an issue that is deemed to be bad taste rather than anything breaking laws or regulatory standards.

A different stereotype of teenagers is shown in the US Movie Bad Neighbours. Which depicts teenagers not as being dangerous anti social youths, but the other stereotype the media likes to push against teenagers. The ‘binge’ narrative comes alive here. Depicting that teenagers are alcoholic psychopaths who let alcohol get the better of them, throw massive house parties and disrupt neighborhoods. The Bad Neighbours movie depicts a normal couple moving in next door to these teenagers, and their constant struggle against them to just live a normal life with these party animals creating a huge disturbance. This is then passed along to the viewer. People will gain that there is an ideology of teenagers being like this, and will have a re occurring thought in their head when they see teenagers late at night, that they are going to cause a huge disturbance by throwing a big party and ruining a night for everyone else.

Moreover Teenage stereotypes are also shown in TV. In the TV Show Harry Enfield and Chums On the skit following the family of the Paterson’s. It shows a miserable moody teenager, who dresses scriffy listens to rock music and never does anything his parents tell him. This is the most stereotypical representation of a teenager, being that it shows he is a huge rebel to his parents by being a complete pain to them. In one skit that shows Kevin (the teenagers) 13th

Teenagers in the Media

birthday, it shows him transform almost werewolf like into this shouting, loud, miserable teenager. This is a microcosm for all the stereotypes of teenagers in the media.

Likewise The Catherine Tate show depicts a teenage school girl who is the epitome of a ‘young chav’ this show puts teenagers in the bracket of being a yob, disruptive dumb teenager. In the school she is depicted as intellectually inferior to those around he, whilst also maintaining a low standard of formality, she sits slouched, chewing gum and has her hair and make up messy. This shows the difference and divide in teenagers, that there are the supposedly ‘bad’ and ‘good teenagers. But the show only focuses on her, the ‘bad’ type. This ideology is then reinforced throughout the show as a whole and is a huge misrepresentation of young teenage girls.

The most iconic contemporary British teenage show of all time the inbetweeners is a depiction of young teenage boys passing into adulthood. The inbetweeners are a group of 4 boys, who every stereotypical class of teenager. Intially we have Jay. Jay is the sex crazed, alcoholic who represents the testosterone filled brand of teenager, the type that constantly brags and only talks about girls. This is a stereotype of the dumb but sex crazed group. Moreover Simon is the average person in the group, he is happy go lucky. But comes with flaws, flaws such as social awkwardness and always going on about the one girl all the time. Will represents the group that are mostly not talked about or shown in the media, the clever sort, the type that do good in the world; mostly. Unfortunately for these, they couldn’t be represented by anyone worse, Will is consistently embarrassed by people aswell as mocked and changes who he is to fit in. And finally we have Simon, Simon is the comic relief of the group, he represents the social group of teenagers that are not as intellectually adept as the others, however Simon unfairly represents this group as he is often ridiculed by the other 3 and people at school and he doesn’t realise this meaning that the cycle of subconscious bullying continues.

Teenagers in the media are represented by the bad minority. As a whole, this is the same for most groups of people. The media likes to drive an agenda against a specific type of person aswell as force the ideology into the minds of the public. Being a teenager myself its embarrassing at times to see how the media represent us as a whole. This ideology needs to be challenged in the media to show the positive light instead of focusing on the negative. An initial start would be more positive stories in the press rather than front pages depicting a gang of lads being yobbish ‘chavs’.’ Moreover, there doesn’t seem to be a change in this because of man factors. One being that all of the TV Shows and Films I mentioned are or were very successful. This demand for the same type of content leads to a surge of the stereotyping. An example of this being the inbetweeners creating a movie and a sequel to that.

Bibliographyhttp://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/hoodies-louts-scum-how-media-demonises-teenagers-1643964.html

Teenagers in the Media

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/manchester/5334510.stm

https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2006/sep/11/ukguns.ukcrime