Why are we as a nation obsessed with crime and police shows??

Why are we as a nation obsessed with crime and police shows??

Here are some examples:

Cops
Animal Cops
Cold Case
Without a Trace
Law and Order and all of its spin offs
CSI and all of its spin offs
Saving Grace
The Closer
Bones
In Plain Sight (U.S. Marshals)

Add in any that I missed…trust me, you’ll find a show out there.
These shows are on every day of the week without fail. First runs, reruns and marathons.

Why do these shows dominate the air waves?? Is this what people really want to watch or are we just being brainwashed?? Every time I turn on the TV, there they are. They have been there for years and years. Remember T.J. Hooker??

Are these shows a way of keeping us in line, getting it into our heads that we cannot get away with a major crime? To preserve social order to some degree?? To believe and trust authority?

Or perhaps it’s that we need everyday heroes. Out there, on the streets, men and women, every day doing their jobs.

I’m not saying that I haven't watched some of these shows on occasion, but come on. I’m also a mostly law abiding citizen, so it’s not that I’m anti-police. It just seems to me that these shows are dis-proportionately high in their numbers.

Go ahead and look at your TV guide and tell me what you see besides a society that tells you what to think, eat, wear and in this case…watch.

Let me know if you agree or disagree and why.

Well my look on it is a bit simpler than yours. Not sure which of us is wrong but here is my thought on it.
Yeah there were shows like this before though it didn’t seem like as many as there are now.

Anyway I think it is because at least on these shows people can see some justice being done. In our world today there is so much corruption even in the life of many of the average man. That we as a whole are looking for criminals to get what they deserve even if it is all fantasy. People are seeking justice in any way they can. On the TV shows they see that justice. In real life they are starving for that justice.

Just my simple view of it though.

Raist

There has been an interest in cop shows on TV since as long as I remember,and my generation was the first to grow up and suffer from the cursed addiction. I can remember shows like"Boston Blackie" "Highway Patrol" " Tales Of Texas Rangers" in the 50s. There is nothing as crazy as chase scenes in old Nashes and Studebakers. I know that a lot of people that are obsessed with "Cops" and watch the reruns almost every minute of their free time on cable or satellite. It has to be gratifying to see the people that live in the ghettos and trailer parks on drugs and alcohol living miserable lives or something like that. A person can either relate to, feel empathy for, or feel superior to people in their situation. That's Entertainment?

Ouch, that is sort of painting the picture with a broad brush.

I know people who live in the “ghetto” and in trailer parks that do neither, they also do not break the law. I even lived in a trailer park for a time, you do what you have to until better times come. I also was not breaking the law.

To say it like that makes it sound as if everyone who lies in either place is doped up or drunk 24/7. If people want to see pathetic excuses of humans all they need to do is watch reality TV that has become popular over the years. Trailer parks and ghettos have nothing to do with it.


I have to admit though I watch Family Guy and this thread reminds me of the one where he is watching a live cops show. They show his house and he says there has got to be a fat drunk guy in the house. About that time they bust in his door and he sees himself and cheers the cops. Then he says “fatty is resisting beat him with you clubs” then the cop proceed to beat him. That one always cracks me up.

Raist

reply to post by Raist


Raist, I have lived in very rough neighborhoods, and also in an exclusive gated community with a golf course, lake and no mortgage. I at this very minute I am living in a trailer with a mortgage that I won't live long enough to even pay off 10% of. I did not infer that people with little or even no income were of the criminal element. Believe me I have seen more than a few criminals that were trust fund baby's. They will seldom if ever show any rich guy getting his door kicked in, with his kids screaming in horror, as he is thrown face down on the floor, on any series of "COPS",though will they? Forgive me if I gave the impression that I personally had labeled people from any income level of having a disproportionate number of criminals. I have been up and down the socioeconomic ladder too many times to not realize that isn't the truth.

It is okay I guess I did misunderstand what you were saying. I have never lived in a gated community though I have driven past a few.

I agree that often you do not see the rich guy getting thrown to the ground on COPS but I believe there is a reason for that for the most part. We even discussed this in one of my classes. It seems that often the “rich” guy that is a criminal is often into the white collar crime such crime where they are not running from the police through high speed chases but often running off to some foreign land.

Those who are less than fortunate though end up committing crimes that are more street centered. Crimes such as drug dealing, robbery, car theft and such. For the most part it involves the more seen and recognized crimes. Embezzlement is not often seen by the public and when brought to the light it has gone on for years and the criminal is on their way out of the country. Not saying that this is how it always happens but the criminals often commit crime that is available to them in the area in which they live through their social class. Very seldom do you see the rich guy selling drugs or robbing someone nor do you see the poor guy living in the more depressed part of town embezzling money from the local bank.

So it is not the social class that predicts the show but more so the crimes that are more often committed. I hope that makes some sense. And in this case I understand your comments in the previous post.

Raist

reply to post by wolf241e


I think you have to divide them into two groups.
I like the real ones, like Cops, whereas the fictional like CSI are torture to me, full of lame moral posturing and unreal-in-my-experience personnel.
The saying used to be, we watch America's Most Wanted to see if we are on it, and we watch Cops to look for our friends.
Several times I have had friends featured on the local version, Utah's Most Wanted...or at least acquaintances...So it's not an unrealistic expectation.
Also, I am a vicious racist, and Cops for example is one of the few shows that depicts black persons in a version that I find recognizable. I suspect many other persons feel the same way but are perhaps more reluctant to express a non-groovy point of view out loud.
But more broadly, functioning as a member of the lower/criminal/or-working classes, the more highly-filtered and mediated fictional shows are more soaked in the dominant false paradigm in which I am not vested.
Hopefully this is helpful...

reply to post by Raist


Hey there Raist

That's a good thought, that we are seeing justice being done. A shame that it rarely happens in the real world like it does on TV.
But I do see your point.
A shame that we have to turn to a TV show to feel like something is actually getting done, from a legal stand point.

Originally posted by nine-eyed-eel
reply to post by wolf241e

 

The saying used to be, we watch America's Most Wanted to see if we are on it, and we watch Cops to look for our friends.

Now that is really a new one for me. I have watched cops just like the next guy but I've never looked to see if a friend of mine was on the show. That is too weird.
I don't know what I would do if I recognized someone on the show. Laugh from mild shock, I guess.

I have noticed the same thing.. What's up with this Law & Order trend. For whatever reason, this type of programming makes me paranoid.

Personally I cannot stand cop shows... and avoid watching them at all cost. Just as I avoid cops on the street. I have no idea what the obsession might be, but there are far more interesting things to waste my time on.

Originally posted by wolf241e
reply to post by Raist

 

Hey there Raist

That's a good thought, that we are seeing justice being done. A shame that it rarely happens in the real world like it does on TV.
But I do see your point.
A shame that we have to turn to a TV show to feel like something is actually getting done, from a legal stand point.

Also I might add to what I was saying in the earlier post. I think it might also have to do with at one time the police were seen as honorable and looked up to as heroes. Today they are often seen in a much worse light due to the publicity the bad cops get. I think people still sort of want to look up to them for the most part so the TV heroes are all they have as the media demonizes all the police (not all are bad people). I have three police living within a block and a half radius of me and have yet to ever be given any grief and I own a car that should attack their attention.

Your right though it is sad that people must look to the TV to find justice or heroes. Sadly much of the time it is the lawyers (mostly the defense) that work to get the real criminals back onto the streets. While many prosecutors are over worked and underpaid so they don’t try as hard as they should. But why try when you have a judge sitting on the bench who is going to let a child molester get off with a slap on the wrist. It is all one big circle that could be fixed but so many don’t care, that nothing is ever done.

Raist

Hi raist, I was at a gathering of profession woman that included two court reporters. they were talking about a guy named Johnny that was coming over. when he arrived I stood up to introduce myself and as we were about to shake hands he says "I am a defense lawyer. I lie for a living". The next thing I know he is setting up lines of coke on the coffee table. Kind of reinforces your observations about the character of these guys.

reply to post by hypervigilant


Hey HV,

I hear you on this one. It always seems like the defense lawyers are the bad guys.
The way that I understand it, from a long time friend who is a defense lawyer, is that when you've passed the BAR and have been an active lawyer for a short while, you change. You do your time being an uncorruptable, gonna save the world and put away the bad guys, prosecutor of an assistant DA.
But there is no money in it and you have monster student loans to pay off.. All of the $$$ is on the defense side. So, I guess that you change.
I've also heard the drug lawyers are paid in drugs half of the time. Yeah, it could just be rumors, but then again.

Until the system stops rewarding the defense side of law, there will always be corruption on all levels of it.

reply to post by mapsurfer_


i do not watch cop shows either. actually i turned my tv off altogether. guess what? i started reading and writing more and started learning to play a guitar. just feels too much like mass hypnotism. people look to the tv for role models and the norm. i.e. how to behave. tv creates the norm.

the sub conscience interprets what happens on tv as reality. there are many subtle clues if you look for them, on cops, law and order, etc.

on Law and Order, usually, a problem is exacerbated because the authorities just did not have enough authority; and, a viscious psychopath goes free because of those pesky rights of the citizens.

Cops is outright in your face----the abuse we are being programmed to accept. busting windows out of cars and the likes. many times on this show the officer blatently disregards due process. programs us to believe we don't deserve rights. welcome to the police state.