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Media Representation By Wendy Chan And Dorthy Chunn

910 Words4 Pages

Wendy Chan and Dorthy Chunns “Media Representations of Race, Crime and Criminal Justice” provides not only a retelling of violent crimes and how the white media depicts such acts in order to fit the “white is right” narrative but critically engages and analyzes the ways in which these media depictions negatively harm minorities in Canada. This piece is filled with opinions, facts and queries that all engage with the relationship between crime, media representation and intersectionality. The most interesting sections from the reading are; newsworthiness and crime reporting, the symbiotic relationship between police and journalists and the erosion of the line between fact and fiction in relation to the spectacle that is criminal justice.
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As previously mentioned people love consuming media, and this in turn results in crime being turned into media. Facts, victims, truth and the entire judiciary system are completely removed to create a bite-sized piece of information to be watched and consumed (pg. 61). The lines between fact and fiction slowly begin to bleed away as facts are removed to make room for details that will sell. Race is then either weaponized or used to depict victims/accused as racist stereotypes. Chan and Chunns use the case of Reena Virk as an example of this effect, her case was quickly turned into a late-night special that could be dissected and produced into spin-offs, tv shows, podcasts, etc (pg. 63). Allowing for the media to make a judgment that weighs more than evidence and judicial …show more content…

Trends come and go within a week, similar to how people view cases in the media, one week they wanna hear this, and the next something completely different. It completely alters or removes the spotlight from one to the other, this can result in favouritism towards one crime compared to the other. Unfortunately, the government can’t move as quickly as the trend cycle, so it causes delays within the justice system for those trying to use these trends to their

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The media can be aggravating, they are constantly in someone’s business. But sometimes the media can have a positive impact on situations. In the cases of Greg Kelley and Walter McMillian the media actually had a positive impact on the results. The cases were very similar, botched investigations, little to no evidence, falsely accused, and a rally of support. When these cases were looking bleak the media stepped in and boosted the cases to the public.

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Although race is an important factor of Canadian law, there is limited data on its connection with the criminal justice system. Millar and Owusu-Bempah will reveal how the police suppresses data on the race of victims and offenders, which makes it more difficult to conduct anti-racism research and easier for police to implement racial profiling (2011). Also, the authors will argue that intelligence collection conducted by powerful institutions such as police, serves to their advantage rather than the public’s, due its confidentiality. Hence, the authors will explore the race data available and unavailable, but required. Millar and Owusu-Bempah draw on how contemporary studies reveal the disproportionate racial populations in Canadian incarceration,

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The integration of Central High was a long and arduous process. Being a major part of civil rights history, it revealed how racist people can be. But how did society learn about this? The answer to that is quite simple: Media. The books, A Mighty Long Way, by Carlotta Walls LaNier and Little Rock Girl 1957, by Shelly Tougas both show ways media was used.

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In the second article Mark Peffrey and Jon Hurwitz (1997) expres public perceptions of crime and the role stereotyping can affect the way people think. This article focuses more on the negative ways people of colour are perceived when it comes to crime, unfortunately till this day, this can still be an issue. The writers speak on how society has unfortunately suffered from how black people are more likely than whites to be seen as criminal suspects and also more likely portrayed as physically threatening which is noted by Jamieson (1992). There are a variety of opinions on this, when negative stereotyping like this occurs it can never be considered as a good thing for the world, and the fact that the media plays such a huge role in this is

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line of information, even though its viewers tend to come up with judgment before the evidence is confirmed. Media Bias, I don’t think most realize that you only see what the media wants you to see, believe what they want you to believe. The main idea that I want to get at is these stories involving police brutality, the media focus on racism as the central issue than just reporting the abuse of law enforcement which is the central problem. Until someone decides to say something this will continue to be a problem, but it will never really seem like a problem until they presented it as one.

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Not only does the media have a scarcely portrayal of minorities, but when they do, they repetitively show them in a repetitive negative manner, which is how stereotypes form. For example, when Michael Nam discusses how the news chooses to depict a person in a certain manner because of that person’s race “The type of coverage that gets chosen by editorial staffs then reinforce stereotypes rather than clarifies the news. This is apparent in the different ways white subjects and black subjects are portrayed, such as black victim Michael Brown, who ‘struggled with police before the shooting,’ versus white Aurora shooter James Eagan Holmes, remembered as a ‘brilliant science student’ ” (Nam

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