Moral panic

A moral panic is a widespread feeling of fear, often an irrational one, that some evil person or thing threatens the values, interests, or well-being of a community or society.

Quotes

• Public fear, and those responsible for creating or promoting it, are major topics of discussion these days. The sociological and criminological concept known as moral panic offers valuable insights into how and why powerful social agents such as the news media and politicians deliberately create public concern or fear of an individual or group. Moral panic has been defined as a situation in which public fears and state interventions greatly exceed the objective threat posed to society by a particular individual or group who is/are claimed to be responsible for creating the threat in the first place.
  • Moral Panic: Who Benefits From Public Fear? Moral panics maintain the status quo. Scott A. Bonn, Psychology Today, July 20, 2015

• Central to the moral panic concept is an argument that public concern or fear over an alleged social problem is mutually beneficial to state officials—that is, politicians and law enforcement authorities—and the news media. The relationship between state officials and the media is symbiotic in that politicians and law enforcement need communication channels to distribute their rhetoric and the media need tantalizing news content to attract a wide audience which, in turn, attracts advertisers... Moral panics arise when distorted mass media campaigns are used to create fear, reinforce stereotypes and exacerbate preexisting divisions in the world... Finally, public hysteria over a perceived problem often results in the passing of legislation that is highly punitive, unnecessary, and serves to justify the agendas of those in positions of power and authority.... Politicians are....vital actors in a moral panic drama. As elected officials who must operate in the court of public opinion, politicians must present themselves as the protectors of the moral high ground in society. Similar to law enforcers, politicians have a sworn duty and moral obligation to protect society from folk devils when they arise.
  • Moral Panic: Who Benefits From Public Fear? Moral panics maintain the status quo. Scott A. Bonn, Psychology Today, July 20, 2015

• Moral panic is a situation in which media reporting has created a folk devil of a particular social group, and the public demand of the authorities that something is done about it. This expression of concern is described as a moral panic because it is based on an outraged sense of offense to public standards of behavior, though the information which prompts it is often limited and inaccurate. Folk devils refer to a group whose common interest or activity has become stigmatized by society and becomes the target for adverse comments and behavior. The criminological and sociological concept known as moral panic offers valuable insight into why and how powerful social agents like the media create public concern...Moral panic is recognized in the sociology of deviance and crime as well as being related to the labeling theory of deviance.
  • Moral Panic and Folk Devils (Cohen 1972), By Mia Belle Frothingham, Simply Psychology, Oct 28, 2021

• You don't want to live in a country in which moral panics breakout regularly. By the way, moral panics diminish the people engage in them and hurt the people who don’t. They're degrading. They're crazy. They're the opposite of what you want. You want to live in a country where wisdom and restraint and rational behavior and decency determine the outcomes not screaming. So for nearly two years, the shouting has not ended. Hysteria is now the official language of public discourse in the United States. That's not good for anyone except those benefiting from it... Who is benefitting? Anyone who lies for a living. The liars have perfect cover.
  • Tucker Carlson, Tucker Carlson explains how moral panics are destroying America, The Post Millennial, Mar 8, 2022

• Stanley Cohen ... identified three intrinsic characteristics of a moral panic: The media singles out a group of people and makes them "devils." These "folk devils" are something all good people should despise. In a moral panic the actual threat is somewhere between little and none, and concern about the group explodes seemingly overnight.
  • Brynn Tannehill, in "The Moral Panic We Cannot Ignore"in Dame Magazine (Jan 12, 2023)

See also

• Fear
• Hysteria