The Witchvox Project, #6: 48 Hours
48 Hours, and other tabloid "news" programs
(The Witchvox Project is an ongoing series of posts to this blog, reprinting all of my reviews and media articles from The Witches’ Voice website from 1997 through around 2008. This is being done in tandem with research for my forthcoming book The Witching Hour: How Witches Enchanted the World.)
24 hour news coverage on television, not to mention online, is now so ubiquitous that it’s easy to forget that we didn’t used to have this kind of constant updating of the news. The need to fill up 24 hours with news quickly led to the tendency to turn breaking news stories into frenzied, hyped media events, as well as the need to create “filler” content ranging from cooking segments to single-host programs with interview guests. As well, this constant flow of news gradually turned many news anchors and journalists into commentators and pundits, normalizing the editorializing of news (normally a neutral source of factual information) with political bias.
Meanwhile, daytime talk shows and prime time “news” magazines gained huge popularity and grew in number during the late 1990s and beyond, and those shows took on topical subject matter. Some respected and legitimate programs (like 60 Minutes and Nightline) offered excellent reportage and commentary, while others took a more sensationalistic approach. Celebrity talk show hosts started to be conflated with legitimate journalists and experts. The Satanic Panic was almost entirely driven by sensational media coverage, most notably prime time specials by Geraldo Rivera and repeated daytime coverage by Oprah Winfrey. It was a huge topic on news magazine programs as well, and the increase in school shootings and other violent crimes involving teenagers was often attributed to involvement with the occult. As I’ve written elsewhere, much of the Satanic Panic propaganda is rooted in imagery and storylines from various horror films of the 1960s and 1970sl, including Rosemary’s Baby (1968), The Exorcist (1973), The Devil’s Rain (1975) and The Omen (1976).
This Satanic Panic narrative was extremely harmful to the image of modern pagan religions such as Wicca at the time, and was one of the driving forces behind The Witches’ Voice and our attempt to provide accurate information and debunking of stereotypes and rumors. The following article, analyzing an episode from 1998 of the CBS primetime show 48 Hours, was written during a time when this disturbing trend of blaming “the occult” for teen violence was rampant. Incidentally, the show, which premiered in 1988, later changed its name to 48 Hours Mystery, with a focus on true crime stories, and eventually (by 2010) turned its attention to criminal cases (like the West Memphis Three) that were themselves complicated by Satanic Panic propaganda in the 1990s! Ironic, to say the least.
As we have seen in recent months, this trend to blame “the occult” for everything from school shootings to feminism has begun to increase once again. This continues to be a crucially important topic: I am covering it in my book-in-progress The Witching Hour: How Witches Enchanted the World, and will continue to call attention to in this blog.
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The tabloid-style news program known as 48 HOURS presented a show tonight with several loosely-connected segments, all of which dealt with teenage violence and suicide. Some of the stories are well-known from recent news media attention:
the "conspiracy" shooting in a high school in Pearl, Mississippi, which left two students dead and seven wounded;
the suicides, both attempted and successful, of a group of teens in Keokuk, Iowa;
the suspended sentence of two teenagers convicted of brutally murdering 23 cats in an animal shelter.
The program linked these stories with the rise of teens' interest in Satan worship and "the occult." In seedy tabloid style, 48 HOURS merged images of Marilyn Manson with the cover of Anton LaVey's The Satanic Bible. A red, inverted pentagram was shown at least five times. Perhaps most disturbing, the word "Witchcraft" was used in tandem with "Satanism" a number of times. One teenage girl was detained in jail for a month after providing a friend with the bullets he used to shoot himself. Now, while aiding a suicide is a crime in most states, the program attempted to link this girl's "criminal" behavior with her interest in "witchcraft and spells." If this doesn't make every sixteen-year-old with a copy of Scott Cunningham's Witchcraft Today on her bookshelf nervous, I don't know what will!
Many teens these days express interest in alternative spiritual paths. 48 HOURS wants viewers to believe that such an interest will lead to violent behavior. Such vague "connections" make very dangerous information to portray on a supposed "news" show. Many viewers assume (wrongly, unfortunately) that such shows portray only truth and well-documented research. But if the show's "researchers" (and I use the term loosely) were able to dig up a number of websites on Satanism (which they showed in full color), why on earth were they unable to see the many websites devoted to the peaceful, nature-revering religion that is Modern Witchcraft? Perhaps because tree-hugging hippies and candle-burning magicians aren't "sexy journalism, " but troubled teens who turn to Satan are?
It is disappointing that this show made no attempt to link these kids' home lives or with their problems..In keeping with the very American practice of pointing the finger everywhere but at ourselves, these kids were said to be troubled (depressed, psychotic, etc.) because of their involvement with devil worship; as opposed to their being disturbed or unstable before they delved into it! Better to ask what about their lives was so painful or horrible that they would be driven to such extremes?
A kid raised in a supportive, loving environment is not very likely to walk into the school cafeteria with a hunting rifle and start firing. But by equating this kind of behavior with an interest in "the occult, " 48 HOURS sends the message that a teenager interested in pagan religious beliefs is also prone to such behavior. Why no effort was made to distinguish between Neo-Paganism and Witchcraft on the one hand, and Satanism or devil worship on the other, is perplexing to say the least, especially when so much information about modern Witchcraft exists in books, magazines and on the Internet.
Of course, to make the show look "professional, " there was the obligatory "Occult and Ritual Crime Expert" who gives lectures and advises police detectives on these matters. At one point, this "expert" showed a hand symbol, made with the index finger and pinky raised, explaining it was "the horns of the goat, " or a satanic symbol. To anyone who knows sign language, this symbol also means (surprise!) "I love you." So much for expertise...
Of course teenagers are always going to get involved in rebellious beliefs and activities...but the sociopathic, violent acts like the ones mentioned are signs of a profoundly-disturbed individual...an interest in "evil" or "the devil" is merely a symptom of someone who is poorly socialized, not the cause of that poor socialization! Thousands of teens listen to Marilyn Manson's music and don't kill themselves, or their classmates. Blaming a rock star for inciting violent crime is a sad commentary on the state of responsibility and accountability in our nation.
HOW YOU CAN HELP!
Feel free to tell 48 hours what you think and remember that a quick piece of snail mail has more impact than email, but feel free to do both....
48 Hours
524 West 57th Street
New York, NY 10019
(212) 975-3247
Web Site: http://www.cbs.com/news/48hours/
Email: realitycheck@cbsnews.com
To order a transcript, call: (800) 777-TEXT
To order a videotape, call: (800) 338-4847
Thank you Nitewing for grabbing this contact info for us to share with the community.
also check out Jane's "Pagans and the Press" in our White pages section (thanks Diotima).
CBS and 48 HOURS have some explaining to do... it is simply unacceptable for a so-called "news" show to make such an ignorant blunder as equating Modern Witchcraft with Satan worship...anyone educated about comparative religions knows this, and CBS should have researched this matter more thoroughly. Instead, this show contained much misleading symbolism and information... taking some horrible crimes and equating them with occult activity, then failing to mention the clear differences between devil worship and Neo-paganism...and this could harm teens who have a legitimate interest in earth-centered spirituality.