Critical Problem Construction Through Framing: Amanda Todd and online Bullying

Introduction

Due to the numerous and varying societies and cultures that exist in our society today, it has given rise to a plethora of social problems – with each society differing in the set of social problems it continually faces. Each individual society has its own social structure – the relationships between a society’s individuals, groups, and institutions – that is constantly challenged by these social problems. However, there are frequent criticisms as to how exactly these ‘social problems’ are identified. In “Social Problems: An introduction to Critical Constructionism”, Robert Heiner implies that there is no completely objective way to identify, define, observe, or discuss social problems. Therefore, Heiner attempts to provide a fairly objective definition as to how social problems are defined within the discipline of sociology: “a social problem is a phenomenon regarded as bad or undesirable by a significant number of people, or a number of significant people who mobilize to eliminate it” (Heiner 3).

In his article, Heiner describes social constructionism, which is how the meanings of social problems are constructed. He enumerates the process as such: first, a phenomenon must be identified as problematic; second, there must be an explanation provided for the causes; and lastly and most importantly, there must be successful persuasion of the public that the phenomenon is problematic. However, Heiner lends more focus to critical constructionism – a fusion of George Herbert Mead’s symbolic interactionism and Karl Marx’s conflict theory. The defining difference between social constructionism and critical constructionism is that it emphasizes the role of society’s elite in the process of problem construction (Heiner 10). In addition, Heiner builds on the definition of critical constructionism as he argues that social problems are often constructed by society’s elite “at the expense of those with the least power in our society” (Heiner 10). Another important facet to note is that one of the purposes of critical constructionism is to “give voice to the less powerful groups in a society” – a voice that is usually overshadowed in public debates.

A common technique used in problem construction is framing – adamantly and almost always seamlessly utilized by the media. In “Framing: Towards Clarification of a Fractured Paradigm”, Robert Entman states that framing theory involves the selection of “some aspects of a perceived reality and make them more salient in a communicating text” (Entman 52). More specifically, by framing social problems in a subjectively favorable manner, the media is able to define problems in specific language they prefer, diagnose causes in order to place responsibility or blame on certain people, groups, or occurrences, suggest moral judgments to their audience, and propose solutions and remedies that may favor their intentions. ‘Successful’ framing involves highlighting specific aspects of a problem while also ignoring or watering down others. In the context of newspaper articles, framing can be achieved through the kind of symbols and language used for headlines, the samples of images published alongside, the pool of qualified or unqualified sources quoted, et cetera – all of which are carefully thought out and planned in order to evoke some favored reaction or opinion.

As earlier stated, social problems continually change as shifts in culture occur. In recent years, one major shift has been the rise of a more dominant role that technology plays in everyday life, not only for the working man or woman, but also for your everyday teenager. Due to this platform, social media has now become central to teenagers’ daily routine. The way one is represented is no longer limited to their in-person presence, but it is now also related to the contents of a Facebook profile, the tweets posted from a Twitter account, and the videos one posts on YouTube [among others]. Alarmingly, due to the ease and anonymity social media provides, it has made sexual predation and bullying more adamant. The risk of ‘getting caught’ for these bullies and predators is eliminated or severely cut down due to this ‘progress’ in technology. This becomes very evident in cases like those of Amada Todd – a fifteen year-old girl who committed suicide because of the overwhelming and unwarranted online bullying – in the form of threats and taunts – that stemmed from an unfortunate misstep involving an online sexual predator.

In this essay, I will examine how four techniques of framing are used in the coverage of Amanda Todd’s suicide to garner a sympathetic and understanding response from readers of various newspaper articles. The four techniques are: (1) using certain images to immediately set the tone of the article, (2) mostly quoting sources that possibly echo the newspapers’