Violence in the media

There are several examples where violence in the media can personally effect viewers, and cause them to perform violent acts like murder and torturing. These examples make viewers question why some of these people are able to get their hands on these, and some extreme responses are should violence in the media be banned completely?



This example shows that the boy, 9 years under the age of the recommended age for GTA IV, has shot his grandmother, just like he would in the game and possibly thinking that she would come back to life as the main characters would in game. This leaves the mystery of how an underage child was able to gain access of this game and why he was left to play it unsupervised. Although people could argue that it is the fault of the game and the manufacturers, many people would completely disagree because the age rating has been put on the game for a reason: to prevent things like this from happening. The counter arguments are also is it the shops fault, either the shop had sold the video game straight to the boy or to his parents and that it is the parents who have enabled him to play the game.







Another case that shows how violence in media can have a negative impact on people as these 10 year old boys had clearly got the idea of torture from somewhere, hinted that it has been a video game which has affected them and led them to murder an innocent child. Again, the children are under the age of playing violent video games which have age ratings of 18, which makes people wonder how on earth they were able to gain access to play the game unsupervised.  The counterarguments are why were the boys able to get the game? Did the shop sell it directly to them or did there parents buy it for them and give them permission? And how is this acceptable. Regulation and censorship should be used in instances like this to ensure that nobody underage area able to play games of age rating 18, as it can clearly affect the actions of these children.

The regulation and censorship used for this video game has clearly failed here, as the age rating they had given has not proved effective as it is a dangerous, violent game where underage children were a able to play this game.


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Thomas Hamilton, the mass murderer of the Dunblane killing in 1996, was clearly affected by a film that he had watched ... "Rambo". The man appeared to be mad, as when he was stripped of his scout leadership he was clearly very upset about this and took measures into his own hands. Hamilton had broke into Dunblane school with a machine gun and other weapons. He was dressed as the character Rambo from Sylvester Stalones"Rambo". Wearing a bandana on his head and imitating him. He murdered a teacher and 16 of Andy Murray's classmates when bursting through the hall of the gym and firing. The counter arguments are is it the fault of the movie, is it too violent for viewers which do actually cause people to go and do this, should all movies like this be banned? However, people would disagree as the man was clearly insane and only he can take the blame.  Regulation and censorship could be used here by checking the background of anybody buying the film/game e.g what crime have they committed and have they got any mental illnesses which combined with a violent film could affect them.

The regulations for this film have failed as the age rating they have given does not affect the fact that men with mental illnesses can get their hands on this film.


The audiences of these films and video games will have either an active or an inactive response.

The dominant response that viewers may have are to go out and imitate what they see, which is where they would go and commit a murder or torture somebody.

An oppositional response people would have are that they know they would not do anything like this in their life and would not do anything about it.

A negotiated response people may may have are that if they are being attacked by somebody or see someone being attacked, they may use some violence that they have seen in a film to protect themselves/others.