Scandalization

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As scandal refers to the intentional causing a scandal by advertising and, if bunching of actual or alleged maladministration or wrongdoing. As a rule, scandalization serves to achieve a certain purpose, for example to harm a political opponent, to distract from other grievances or - in the case of media scandalization - to increase the circulation of a book or newspaper or the audience rating of a television station. The term therefore has a negative connotation.

"Execution Journalism"

Media scandalization , colloquially and for the first time as a term coined by Otto Graf Lambsdorff as " execution journalism " is a form of journalism in which journalists, media or media houses drive through scandalous articles and reports, also in the context of targeted media campaigns against people of their personal interest, to either to spark a public discussion on the set topic or to permanently damage the existence of the persons concerned in public, socially and professionally.

The media are taboo keepers and taboo breakers in one. As disseminators of the publicly expressed outrage, they moderate the process on a representative basis and thereby create public opinion. Scandals staged in the media must therefore be fundamentally differentiated from non-media scandals. This is different with targeted media scandal. The staging of media scandals is in the hands of professional journalists. In contrast to non-media scandals, this leads to a greater publicity reach and a permanent presence of scandalous statements. The temporal and spatial presence of the audience determines the persistence of non-media scandals. If the scandal does not cause outrage, the trigger is quickly forgotten. In functionally differentiated societies, scandals staged by the media fulfill a system-preserving function. The media produce a specific narrative scheme for their consumers , which does not necessarily have to correspond to the real facts of the scandal and is perceived as a protection of morality for media consumers . This is also where the social explosive power lies, which the victims concerned perceive as “journalistic incendiary devices” and are referred to as “execution journalism”. The media scandal works with a simple but effective method. The victims he has chosen usually hold better social positions and attract sensational interest by declaring them to be a "case" on the occasion. The media scandal is ultimately the result of a trap in which a taboo breaker has fallen and usually focuses a topic assigned to one person or several people who can answer all open questions on this topic as the only source of information. The more prominent the victim, the greater the interest. Details of the violation of the norm are often reported with hypocritical indignation, especially when it comes to sexual escapades. Through targeted images and headlines, the media create a downright collective hysteria against the taboo breakers concerned. The persons concerned are literally subjected to the "media process". The authors of the media scandal also resort to the method of artificial exaggeration and deliberate misrepresentation or deliberately subvert the dignity of the persons concerned to be scandalized in public. The victim is therefore often faced with research and rumors - and at some point it no longer matters whether the allegations are true or not. Whether the media scandal actually turns into a scandal depends on how many prominent personalities are demanding consequences from the scandal, be it resignations or stricter laws. The public outrage is particularly great when the victim of the scandal is actually very popular. The consequences for the people concerned are not insignificant. The victims hounded through regular press campaigns often lose their social capacity and their professional and social existence, even if afterwards their innocence or the insignificance of the case is established. For many of the people affected, this form of “being publicly pilloried ” is a form of psychological terror that many cannot withstand over a long period of time. According to this, the persons concerned are "rushed" by the public media until they unpack under press or media pressure, give up their social and professional position and / or collapse, or in extreme cases even kill themselves. The people and interest groups who, as journalists or media houses, are responsible for this form of journalism, infiltrate the rule of law through their media scandals and create downright prejudice, which in public opinion equates to the effect of a media execution without a recognized judicial process and therefore also one Representing form of lynching . In its perfidious form, this type of journalism leaves the people concerned with lasting and permanent psychological damage. In public, media scandals lead to social cohesion and identity formation through the visualization and updating of collective values. This thesis, developed from the theoretical assumptions, is substantiated with an etymological outline of the career of the term scandal, which draws a bow from ancient Greek - the scandal as "Stellhölzchen", i.e. H. as the trigger mechanism of an animal trap - through the religious and moral indignation in Christianity to the modern understanding shaped by mass media, which is contextualized by a brief history of the media scandal since the 16th century.

procedure

Media scandals are based on an actual or suspected grievance. They are mostly similar:

  • In the latency phase , a grievance becomes known; the number of media reports on the topic increases suddenly. The protagonists of the scandal are introduced. The phase ends with a
  • Key event. This leads to the conflict escalating into a scandal. In the following upswing phase , further facts become known that are connected to the first grievance. If this expansion is successful, it begins
  • Establishment phase . At this stage the scandal reaches its climax. Now the guilt or innocence of the protagonists is judged; Consequences are demanded. At the beginning of the downturn, the scandalized person or organization buckles under public pressure and draws conclusions from the incidents (e.g. resignation )
  • This resolves the conflict in media perception. The intensity of the reporting decreases quickly.
  • In the rehabilitation phase , the social system is restored. The media only report sporadically.

With the five phases, the structure of a media scandal largely corresponds to that of an ancient drama .

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Steffen Burkhardt: Media scandals. On the moral explosive power of public discourse . Cologne 2006, p. 381 ff .
  2. ↑ Joachim von Gottberg: Scandalization, outrage, consequences. Media and taboos. In: Voluntary Self-Control Television [FSH] (Ed.): Tv diskurs. Taboos. Culturally set, negotiated through the media . 14th year, no. 4/10 . Berlin 2010, p. 18-23 .
  3. ^ Steffen Burkhardt: Media scandals. On the moral explosive power of public discourse . Cologne 2006, p. 181 ff .

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