London Riots Newspaper Analysis

The Guardian London Riots Article

What Sensationalist Language is used?


"It's just mindless thuggery" 


This was said a local resident in London who's 100 year old shop was burned down leaving him and his father distraught, getting the point of view from a victim of the rioting shows how they are having a massive negative effect on society. Most people's thoughts are expressed through this saying, which in turn makes the public opinion of today's youths become negative. Also by using a victim of the riots it creates sympathy towards him which creates a feeling of dislike towards the youths. It's described that the smoke from the fire was so thick that the residents found it extremely difficult to breathe, this just shows that the youths don't care about the well-being of others and only care about causing mayhem. This guardian news article just shows how dangerous youths are as well, they could have quite easily of hurt or killed somebody with the fires and violence that they continued to use for what appeared to be no point what so ever.

"Horrendous spectacle"


His was said by it Malthouse, London's deputy Mayor of policing. By getting someone of great profession to express his opinion about the riots makes the subject matter important because he is an important person in London. He uses the word "Horrendous" because its horrible to see the destruction that is happening within the area of London and uses the word "Spectacle" because it is a huge event taking place with loads of different violent events for people to see. Its sort of an opposite to when people would call a parade a spectacle because of all the different people dressed up and dancing. This creates a sense of hatred towards the youth rioters because of the negativity the guardian focuses on.

What images are used?


There is only one image used in this article, the image being one masked youth with his hood up on a sporty tracksuit there is a vehicle engulfed inflames behind him with the smoke creating a massive fog overhead. The caption of the image displays "A masked man on the streets of Hackney where a car burns out of control on the third day of street disturbances across London." This image represents how youths are bad because there is a masked youth in the centre of the picture and he's surrounded by damaged cars on fire with smoke everywhere, because he's i the centre of the reason it suggests h that youths are the main reason for the bad events taking place in London.

How does the article construct representation of youth identity?
Is the article biased?
Are youths given a fair voice?


Youths in this article are shown in a bad light throughout it as the situations are being discussed and the youths are the height of each topic. A various amount of events are discussed from looting to a 100 year old shop being burnt down completely putting the residents lives in danger, when reading the article it could be about any gangs, however, it is clearly labelled that the youths are the main offenders in this situation. However, I don't believe this article is biased because all of the reactions are from actual events that occurred during the riots and it shows evidence that youths are committing crimes as the image suggests. They are only commenting on events that actually happened which makes this article not at all biased in my opinion. No youths have been questioned in this article so they are unable to give their opinion, leading me to think that they are not given a fair voice, there are two sides to every story and there is only one side to it in this article. The youths are unable to defend themselves and this is why they are demonized by the public because articles make them out to all be bad which creates a moral panic in society.