Fearmongering,orscaremongering,is the act of intentionally fomenting feelings of fear by using exaggerated rumors of impending danger.[1][2]
Theory
editAccording toevolutionary anthropologyandevolutionary biology,humans have a strong impulse to pay attention to danger because awareness of dangers has been important for survival throughout theirevolutionaryhistory. The effect is amplified bycultural evolutionwhen thenews mediacater to people's appetite for news about dangers.[3]
The attention of citizens is a fiercely contested resource thatnews media,political campaigners,social reformers,advertisers,civil society organizations,missionaries,and culturalevent makerscompete over, according toattention economy.[4]
Social agentsof all kinds are often using fearmongering as a tactic in the competition for attention, as illustrated by the examples below.[3][5]
Fearmongering can have strongpsychologicaleffects, which may be intended orunintended.One hypothesized effect ismean world syndromein which people perceive the world as more dangerous than it really is.[6][7]Fearmongering can make people fear the wrong things, and use too many resources to avoid rare and unlikely dangers while more probable dangers are ignored. For example, some parents have kept their children at home to preventabductionwhile they paid less attention to more common dangers such aslifestyle diseasesortraffic accidents.[8]Fearmongering can produce arally around the flag effectby increasing support for the incumbent political leaders. For example, official warnings about the risk ofterroristattacks have led to increased support for the proposed policies ofUS Presidents.[9][10]
Collective fear is likely to produce anauthoritarian mentality,desire for astrong leader,strictdiscipline,punitiveness,intolerance,xenophobia,and lessdemocracy,according toregality theory.Historically, the effect has been exploited bypolitical entrepreneursin many countries for purposes such as increasing support for anauthoritariangovernment, avoidingdemocratization,or preparing the population for war.[11]
Examples
editPolitical campaign advertisements
editDaisyis a famous television commercial that aired in 1964 and was run byLyndon B. Johnson'spresidential campaign.It begins with a little girl standing in a meadow, birds chirping in the background; she picks and clumsily counts the petals off of a daisy. When she reaches 'nine', an ominous male voice begins a launch countdown. The girl's gaze turns toward the sky and the camera zooms into her eye until her pupil blackens the screen. As the countdown reaches zero, a nuclear explosion flashes on and morphs into a mushroom cloud. While the firestorm rages, Johnson's declares, "These are the stakes! To make a world in which all of God's children can live, or to go into the dark. We must either love each other, or we must die." Another voice then says, "Vote for President Johnson on November 3. The stakes are too high for you to stay home."[12]
Mass media
editFierce economiccompetitionis driving commercialmass mediato rely extensively on scary stories and bad news in a competition that has been characterized as an emotionalarms race.[13]Stories about crime, and especially violent crimes and crimes against children, figure prominently among newspaper headlines. An analysis of US newspapers has found that between 10 and 30% of headlines involve crime and fear, with a tendency to a shift of focus from isolated crime events to more thematic articles about fear.[14] In the United Kingdom, the news media have routinely used a focus on gory sex crimes as a parameter of competition. The continued focus on emotionally touching sex crimes has had a strong influence on politics and legislation in the country.[15]
Product advertisements
editAdvertisershave also entered the arena with their discovery that "fear sells". Ad campaigns based on fear, sometimes referred to asshockvertising,have become increasingly popular in recent years. Fear is a strong emotion and it can bemanipulatedto persuade people into making emotional rather than reasoned choices. From car commercials that imply that having fewerairbagswill cause the audience's family harm, todisinfectantcommercials that showpathogenic bacterialurking onevery surface,fear-based advertising works.[16]While using fear in ads has generated some negative reactions by the public, there is evidence to show that "shockvertising" is a highly effectivepersuasiontechnique, and over the last several years, advertisers have continued to increase their usage of fear in ads in what has been called a "never-ending arms race in the advertising business".[17]
AuthorKen Ringwas accused of scaremongering by New Zealand politicianNick Smith.The Auckland seller of almanacs made predictions about earthquakes and weather patterns based on lunar cycles, and some of his predictions were taken seriously by some members of the public in connection with the2011 earthquakesinChristchurch,New Zealand.[18]
Psychological warfare
editFearmongering is routinely used inpsychological warfarefor the purpose of influencing a target population. The tactics often involves defamation of an enemy by means ofsmear campaigns.False flagattacks have been used as a pretext for starting a war in many cases, including theGulf of Tonkin incident,theShelling of Mainila,andOperation Himmler.
Terrorismis also a kind of psychological warfare. It is creating violence and terror in order to get media attention or to scare an enemy.[19][20]
A remarkable tactic is the so-calledstrategy of tension,which is based on making violence and chaos in order to createpolitical instability,todefamean opponent, to pave the way for a moreauthoritarianismorfascistgovernment, or to prevent thedecolonizationofcolonies.The strategy of tension is associated in particular with the widespreadpolitical violencein the so-calledYears of Leadin the 1960s to 1980s inItaly.There were manyterroristattacks in the country in these years. Some of these attacks were committed byright-wingandneo-fascistgroups, and other attacks were attributed toleft-winggroups. Many of the apparent left-wing attacks were suspected or confirmedfalse flagattacks. The main purpose of the strategy of tension in Italy was to prevent thecommunistsfrom gaining power and to pave the way for aneofascistgovernment. Historians disagree about who were controlling the strategy of tension, but there is evidence that both national neofascist groups and foreign powers were involved.[21][22][23][11]
See also
editReferences
edit- ^"Definition of SCAREMONGER".
- ^Cambridge Dictionary- Fearmongering
- ^abShoemaker, Pamela J. (1996). "Hardwired for News: Using Biological and Cultural Evolution to Explain the Surveillance Function".Journal of Communication.46(3): 32–47.doi:10.1111/j.1460-2466.1996.tb01487.x.
- ^Zhu, Jian-Hua (1992). "Issue competition and attention distraction: A zero-sum theory of agenda-setting".Journalism Quarterly.69(4): 825–836.doi:10.1177/107769909206900403.S2CID144203162.
- ^Altheide, David L. (2014).Media Edge: Media Logic and Social Reality.Peter Lang Publishing.ISBN978-1433126451.
- ^Gerbner, G (1980). "The" mainstreaming "of America: violence profile number 11".Journal of Communication.30(3): 10–29.doi:10.1111/j.1460-2466.1980.tb01987.x.
- ^Signorielli, N (1990). "Television's Mean and Dangerous World: A Continuation of the Cultural Indicators Perspective". In Signorielli, N; Morgan, M (eds.).Cultivation Analysis: New Directions in Media Effects Research.Sage. pp. 85–106.
- ^Glassner, B (1999).The Culture of Fear: Why Americans are Afraid of the Wrong Things.Basic Books.
- ^Willer, R (2004). "The effects of government-issued terror warnings on presidential approval ratings".Current Research in Social Psychology.10(1): 1–12.
- ^Nacos, B. L. (2011).Selling Fear: Counterterrorism, the Media, and Public Opinion.University Of Chicago Press.ISBN978-0226567198.
- ^abFog, A (2017).Warlike and Peaceful Societies: The Interaction of Genes and Culture.Open Book Publishers.ISBN978-1783744053.
- ^"Classic Political Ad: Daisy Girl (1964)".YouTube.26 October 2006.Archivedfrom the original on 2021-12-19.Retrieved25 August2010.
- ^Fuller, J (2010).What is happening to news: The information explosion and the crisis in journalism.University of Chicago Press.ISBN978-0226005027.
- ^Altheide, D. L. (2002).Creating fear: News and the construction of crisis.Aldine de Gruyter.ISBN978-1138521438.
- ^Greer, C (2003).Sex Crime and the Media: Sex Offending and the Press in a Divided Society.Routledge.ISBN978-1843920045.
- ^Nedra Weinreich (3 June 2006)."Making Fear-Based Campaigns Work".Archived fromthe originalon 24 December 2008.Retrieved15 January2009.
- ^Barbara Righton (December 18, 2006)."Fear Advertising".Archived fromthe originalon 23 February 2007.Retrieved15 January2009.
- ^"'Reckless' quake claims not helping, says Smith ".ONE News. 20 March 2011.
- ^Weimann, G; Winn, C (1994).The theater of terror: Mass media and international terrorism.Longman.
- ^Altheide, D. L. (2006).Terrorism and the Politics of Fear.AltaMira Press.
- ^Ferraresi, F (1996).Threats to Democracy: The Radical Right in Italy after the War.Princeton University Press.
- ^Cento Bull, A (2007).Italian Neofascism: The Strategy of Tension and the Politics of Nonreconciliation.Berghahn Books.
- ^Willan, P (1991).Puppetmasters: The Political use of Terrorism in Italy.Authors Choice Press.