Abstract
New media formats and technologies raise questions about new-found abilities to indulge apparently limitless violent and sadistic curiosity within our culture. In this context the mainstreaming of sex and violence via mobile and screen media systems opens important questions about the degree to which these influences are harmful or indicative of deeper social problems. In this article we offer a preliminary analysis of the consequences of these new media zones, acknowledging their allure, excitement and everyday cultural position. In particular we focus on a distinctive hallmark of much online pornography and massively popular violent videogames - the offer of unchecked encounters with others who can be subordinated to violent and sexual desire. We suggest that a key implication of these zones of cultural exception, in which social rules can be more or less abandoned, is their role in further assisting denials of harm from the perspective of hyper-masculinist and militaristic social value systems.
Highlights
One key narrative regarding crime in western societies is of an ascending arc of civility and declining violence (Spierenburg 2008; Pinker 2011; Muchembled 2012)
We offer a reconnaissance of two spaces within the contemporary media-scape—online pornography and violent video games—that epitomize a broader patterning between digital media and the viewing of extreme violent and sexual practices that celebrate forms of social subjugation and unfeeling destruction
In the spirit of attempting to weave a common theoretical thread between seemingly distinct media spaces, we present a snapshot of two cultural zones of exception in the form of online pornography and violent video games
Summary
New media formats and technologies raise questions about new-found abilities to indulge apparently limitless violent and sadistic curiosity within our culture. In this context, the mainstreaming of sex and violence via mobile and screen media systems opens important questions about the degree to which these influences are harmful or indicative of deeper social problems. We offer a preliminary analysis of the consequences of these new media zones, acknowledging their allure, excitement and everyday cultural position. We suggest that a key implication of these zones of cultural exception, in which social rules can be more or less abandoned, is their role in further assisting denials of harm from the perspective of hyper-masculinist and militaristic social value systems
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