Media circus

Media circus describes a news event where the media coverage is perceived to be out of proportion to the event being covered, such as the number of reporters at the scene, the amount of news media published or broadcast, and the level of media hype. The term is meant to critique the media by comparing it to a circus and, as such, is an idiom and not an objective observation. Media hype, orgy, circle jerk and frenzy are similar terms used in reference to a critique of news and entertainment media.

Although the idea is older, the term media circus began to appear around the mid 1970s. An early example is from the 1976 book by author Lynn Haney, in which she says "Their courtship, after all, had been a media circus".^[1] A few years later The Washington Post had a similar courtship example in when it said "Princess Grace herself is still traumatized by the memory of her own media-circus wedding to Prince Rainier in 1956."^[2] The term has become increasingly popular with time since the 1970s.

Reasons for being critical of the media are as varied as the people who use the term. However, at the core of most criticism is that there may be a significant opportunity cost when other more important news issues get less public attention as a result of coverage of the hyped issue.

Media circus is the central plot device in the 1951 movie Ace in the Hole about a self-interested reporter covering a mine disaster. It cynically examines the relationship between the media and the news it reports. It was originally called The Big Carnival, with "carnival" referring to what we now call a "circus".

Examples

News media satellite up-link trucks and photojournalists gathered outside the Prudential Financial headquarters in Newark, New Jersey in August, 2004 following the announcement of evidence of a terrorist threat to it and to buildings in New York City.

Events described as a media circus include:

• In the United Kingdom:
  • The cancer, death and funeral of Jade Goody^[3]
  • The Disappearance of Madeleine McCann
  • The February 2009 Great Britain and Ireland snowfall
  • The GCap Media merger in 2005

• In the United States:
  • David Gelman, Peter Greenberg, et al. in Newsweek on January 31, 1977: "Brooklyn born photographer and film producer Lawrence Schiller managed to make himself the sole journalist to witness the execution of Gary Gilmore in Utah....In the Gilmore affair, he was like a ringmaster in what became a media circus, with sophisticated newsmen scrambling for what he had to offer."^[4]
  • The rescue of Jessica McClure, October 14-16, 1987
  • The O. J. Simpson trial, from 1994-1995
  • The Blizzard of '96 (1996). "...this storm ...so hyped by the media in the same way that the O. J. Simpson murder case became hyped as the "Trial of the century." (Elizabeth Davis, The Daily Beacon, January 12 1996).[2]
  • The trial of Martha Stewart (2004). "The stone-faced Stewart never broke stride as she cut a path through the media circus." (Newsweek, "Martha's Fall", March 15 2005 [3])
  • The Clinton-Lewinsky scandal, from 1998-1999
  • The 2004 Super Bowl XXXVIII halftime show controversy
  • The 2005 People v. Jackson
  • The 2005 divorce of Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston
  • The 2009 flu pandemic
  • The 2009 Death of Michael Jackson
  • The 2009 balloon boy hoax

• In Australia:
  • The 2005 Cronulla riots
  • The Beaconsfield Mine collapse "Media circus comes digging for gold", Sydney Morning Herald, May 4, 2006.
  • The information of Swine influenza

References

See also

• Media event
• Cause célèbre
• Trial by media
• Sensationalism
• Media scrum
• Missing white woman syndrome
• Deviancy amplification spiral
• Journalism
• Propaganda
• Popular culture
• It's Not News, It's FARK
• 24-hour news cycle

External links

• List of journalism issues
• MediaCircus.com (a website dedicated to the left-wing media bias)