in my opinion

The Need for Peace in Media

By Emma McGraw

Turn on the 11 o’clock news or open up the daily newspaper and, more likely than not, there is going to be coverage of a violent conflict. Whether it is as complicated as a war or as local as an armed robbery at a gas station, violent stories are commonplace in media coverage. The pervasiveness of these images influences people to see their surrounding world as a violent and scary place and less able to trust in nonviolent solutions to conflict. In fact, the Federal Communications Commission reports that 60% of American television portrays violent acts, and that by the time the average American child turns 18 he or she will have seen about 200,000 violence-related images on television. Decades of research into the effects of media violence have concluded that heavy television viewing by children increases the chances of learning aggressive attitudes and behaviors, becoming desensitized to real world violence, and developing a fear of becoming a victim of violence.

While being bombarded with violent images and sensationalized stories has wrought these effects in the American public, having a media that promotes peace journalism could very well have the opposite influence. For example, if people saw images and instances of reconciliation and reconstruction alongside, and as successful alternatives, to the tragedy of violence and war, they could begin to see peace as a viable option – as a better way to ‘win’. The United States is labeled by some as a culture of violence fed by entertainment and news media alike. It’s time that media shift away from its appetite for violence and, in doing so, show the public peace is not only possible but within reach.