MEDIA REGULATION

MEDIA REGULATION         

“Changes in society have been reflected by changes in media regulation. Discuss this view”

Over the years society has changed in many ways and media has become more regulated. Most countries have some form of a regulatory body that sorts through every form of media and decide which ones are suitable for the country and they also decide which age group it is suitable for. In New Zealand, the main regulatory body is the OFLC (Office of Film and Literature Classification) David Shanks is the chief censor. They regulate most forms of media that are distributed into the country and also can, in collusion with the government, pass punishment on to people who have copies of the forbidden material. Livingston and Lunt came up with the regulation theory which stated that the protection of media limits people's freedom and creativity. Recently many movies have fallen victim to ‘cancel culture’ due to scenes that show objectionable material such as racism, representing children in an inappropriate light.

The OFLC classifies media in 6 different classifications, G (General), PG (Parental Guidance), M (Mature), R13 (Restricted 13), R16 (Restricted 16) and R18 (Restricted 18) they are able to restrict or ban any material which shows sex, horror, crime, cruelty or violence. If something has been made restricted it means that if it were available freely it would be harmful to society. Anything including the sexual exploitation of children or anything of the sort must be banned. An age rating can be added to any thing with offensive language, self-harm, degrading or demeaning content.

Two examples of movies that have been ‘canceled’ are Dumbo and Song of the South, both of these are movies made by Disney and that were on Disney+. Both of these movies were made in the 1940s when racism was a formality, and there are scenes in both of the movies that have links to racial stereotypes particularly of African American people. In today’s society depictions of stereotypes are not acceptable in the mainstream media and minority groups are being represented today in a way like never before with movements such as BLM ( Black Lives Matter ) which aim to give worldwide support to racial injustice against black people have heavily changed censorship and media consumption in the last couple of years. Disney made both of these movies and have decided not to show song of the south on their Disney+ streaming platform whereas Dumbo is only available on an adult profile and it gives a warning before watching. A counterargument has been raised against the removal and editing of movies that are questionable and the argument is if a movie that doesn’t fit in today’s standards of what is considered right gets deleted or edited, especially if it was made many years ago, then a part of history is being deleted, and also if every questionable source of media is not shown then people won’t be able to see the difference between right and wrong and may fall into the trap of repeating past mistakes.

Some countries have very strict laws which prevent many forms of media from entering the country. The regulatory body which is in China allows the public to view very little amounts of worldwide media and this includes films. In 2019 China allowed the very successful Marvel movie Avengers: End Game to be shown in theatres in the country since not many movies are shown per year this was one of the only movies available in the theatres as a result of this China alone is responsible for 22% of all the money made by the movie from ticket sales alone making over $600 M. In 2014 Sony Entertainment was set to release a new movie called The Interview worldwide, however, a scene was shown in which the leader of North Korea Kim Jong Un was portrayed in a satirical and mocking way and also showing his death. In fear of the repercussion of North Korea possibly seeing this Sony halted their worldwide release of the movie and only released it in certain areas. At the time President Obama firmly wished they had advised him first as they shouldn’t be living in fear of a foreign power.

In New Zealand not too many films are banned or disallowed however in 2017 a Netflix Original 13 Reasons Why was given an RP18 rating due to it depicting suicide and self-harm, as well as sexual assault and drug abuse, RP18 means anyone under the age of 18 needs an adult or guardian watching with them. New Zealand made this choice as they have one of the highest teen suicide rates in the world and this was a precaution to prevent possible copycats. Marshall McLuhan created the media effects theory and it stated that every form of media has some sort of meaning behind it intended or not. 13 Reasons Why shows this clearly as they never intended to cause copycats, in fact, they intended to raise awareness but people can take the meaning of media in different ways and different views. This links to Stuart Halls Reception Theory which talks about an active vs a passive audience, a passive audience may take the show as just a sad story about a girl who took her life but an active audience can see the show and be influenced by it. 

The Mosque shooting in Christchurch 2019, was live-streamed on Facebook by the shooter and was then uploaded many times to the internet and shared around before the OFLC announced owning or distributing a copy was against the law, his manifesto was also taken down from every website that the OFLC could find. Was this a good idea for them to do this? People want to be able to watch what they want and for it to be their responsibility if they are negatively affected by it. New Zealand banned its first video game in 2003 called Manhunt due to its depictions of torture and mass murder. It was also banned in the UK, Australia, and Ireland to name a few. 

In conclusion, the media is being regulated heavily and in my opinion it is a bit too much, we can no longer distinguish between a movie which has been edited to be more suitable and in future generations they may not even realise there have been edits on the form of media. Giving people more freedom to choose what they want to watch and what they don’t want to watch.