Formas de legitimación de la violencia en TV

Abstract

Television violence shows some patterns generally accepted by the receiving society. The broadcasting of a violence episode or of an aggression is always seen in context in such a way that it gets to the viewer already evaluated in a positive or negative form. This evaluation shapes some characteristic and differentiated legitimatory patterns that we have tried to identify, using a sample of 140 15-minute random television extracts, distributed to the five conventional television channels that can be seen in the Madrid area (Spain), to qualitatively analyse the different legitimatory patterns of television violence. The evaluation of violence and the very naming and qualification of violent acts needs three elements: aggressors and victims presentation; evaluation of harm and of the consequences of time action; and the qualification of the action. In television broadcasting there is a lot of violence legitimation, from no condemnation of it, to the explicit justification and even to the exaltation. The social acceptance of violence is observed mainly in non-realist programs, like films and series, but it is also presence in news and documentary programs. The legitimatory frames in non-realist programs are widen and less adjusted to the norms of conduct a constitutional state.