Recent Media Interest in self-Injury
Yesterday there were several reports of the following in various newspapers:
http://www.itv.com/news/britain_64db340cd3f25e36518f3c4dd74697d5.html
I am slightly confused as to why these “shocking” statistics have suddenly been revealed. I read the book “By their own Hand” a while back (see my brief review in the Book Review section on the LifeSIGNS site), and have been in contact with the author with my opinions on the research.
While I am of the opinion that any self-injury awareness is usually a good thing, i am getting increasingly frustrated with articles in the media which set out to shock the public, and create moral panics (this frustrates me not just about self-injury I can assure you!) These articles rarely give information which is new, and they rarely give information as to how a person who self-injures can get help for their problems.
We already know that self-injury is a problem. We already know that statistics indicate that it is increasing. We already know the reasons behind self-injury, and that abuse can be a factor involved. Once again the focus on adolescents conveys the message that self-injury only affects younger people. Once again an article which doesn’t really serve a useful purpose. If you hadn’t guessed, I am being repetitive here because the media coverage of self-injury is getting repetitive.
What we need to be focussing our energies on are the ways in which we can reduce the stigma of self-injury, and how we can help people who self-injure find less harmful ways to cope with their problems. This is what the media coverage on self-injury needs to be about, in my opinion anyway! Feel free to disagree!
6 Comments
Wedge
September 1, 2006so much media attention is happening right now, I guess we should be pleased, and aware of sensationalistic journalism…
All I can say is that these journalists better be ready to help raise awareness with us in February in time for SIAD!
Purplefish
August 28, 2006One thing that immediately jumped out at me from this article was the comment regarding how people who consume more alcohol, drugs and cigarettes are more likely to self injure. Maybe i’m missing something here but i dont understand the point of this comparison, it doesn’t achieve anything.
It’s a shame so many people out there think they know a lot about self injury when infact they don’t. Articles like this just reinforce stereotypical information.
I thought we were passed the stage of trying to establish why people self injure although obviously the media are still obsessed with “shocking” statistics that seem to dramatise self injury and cause moral panics, as Mary said.
The Mass Defective
August 27, 2006I was just blog hopping and came across yours. As an adult self injurer I am discouraged not only by reports that it is on the rise amongst teens, but also that most articles seem to portray it as a teen only problem.
Unfortunately, articles like this will continue to be written because “shock value” attracts readers and there aren’t that many places in the world that treat SI.
Sid
sarah
August 25, 2006I agree Mary, and I have moaned about this in a previous post a couple of months ago too. I got a chance to speak on BBC Radio Essex yesterday about this although I was unable to voice my concerns about statistic laden news clearly enough.
I have a further concern that self-injury will begin to be seen as passé, as I read it described in The Metro about a year ago. People who read the paper or listen to the news on a regular basis will have heard about SI before, but as every article is the same they may well feel they already know all about this. But the problem is, do they really? They may have a vague idea but in general the articles or news stories don’t go far enough to give information that will actually help anyone.
What I don’t understand is the obsessive need to always be tinkering with them. At one point its 1 in 10 girls, then 1 in 5 teenagers and I don’t know why they seem to need to create a stereotypical picture of us. I thought statistics are good to illustrate the scale of the problem, but I feel like we’ve been at this point, media wise, for at least five years already.
Dreamer...
August 24, 2006I agree, the article is just stating facts that we already know and making it sound like its some “shocking new discovery”. It kind of feels that they’re saying “look, self injury is on the increase..look at all these teenagers making trouble for us and spoiling the statistics”. And why do so many articles focus on teenagers, not even mentioning other agegroups which kind of re-inforces most stereotypes of self-injurers.
To be honest, I don’t really see the point in the article. It didn’t say anything new and as Mary said, no information on the help available. That’s just my opinion.
Em
August 24, 2006There’s no way that I’m going to disagree as I thought exactly the same when I read that same report on the NTL website yesterday! I don’t know how many times I’ve heard that one in ten young people are self-harming. It’s like they’re saying how appalling it is that so many people are hurting themselves, but, as you say, they’re not producing a solution to an ever increasing issue. Half of the reason why the number of people self-harming is growing is that there’s not enough support from society as a whole.
It upsets me that so many people feel the need to harm themselves, yet they are only frowned upon and not helped.
Emma