Class at the University of Sevilla about dangerous games, young people and risk-taking

1. YOUTH AND RISK-TAKING
The journalistic treatment of youth "dangerous games"
Paola Panarese – Sevilla, April 30th 2019

2. WHAT
SHALL WE
DO TODAY?
Reflection on the relationship between young people
and risk, its journalistic representation and the way in
which an inquiry into “dangerous youth games” could
be made

4. YOUTH
AND RISK
• Adolescence as a
phase of life
“naturally” linked to
risk-taking
• Main causes of
mortality or juvenile
morbidity in
preventable behaviors
• Great space of the
young-risk binomial in
the media
representation

5. WHAT ARE
DANGEROUS
GAMES?
Risk behaviors characterized by apparent novelty,
by the transgression of consolidated social rules,
by the search for the overcoming of physical, legal
or moral obstacles, and by a performative
dimension

6. DO YOU KNOW ANY DANGEROUS GAMES?

7. DO YOU KNOW BALCONING?

9. SURFING SUICIDE
§ Car surfing
§ Ghost riding
§ Train surfing
§ Metro surfing
§ Elevator surfing

10. CHOKING
GAME
• Funky chicken
• Space monkey
• Blackout game
• Jeu du foulard

11. PLANKING

14. DAREDEVIL
SELFIES

15. CINNAMON
CHALLENGE

16. PARKOUR

17. BINGE DRINKING

18. DO YOU KNOW OTHER DANGEROUS GAMES?

19. DANGEROUS GAMES
§ Complex matter
§ Recent literature
§ Ethical issues
§ Alarming and distorted journalistic
representation

32. BLUE WHALE
Italy ranks second in the world for online
searches with keywords like
"BlueWhale", "Bluewhalegame",
"curatorfindme" or "I’mwhale" (17.7% after
the United States with 18%)

33. BLUE WHALE
27% of those using the analyzed
keywords are 17 or younger, but 67%
are over 35 years old.

43. MOMO
CHALLENGE
The image associated with the
Momo account is Bird Mother, a
sculpture exhibited at the Vanilla
Gallery in Tokyo

46. ARE DANGEROUS GAMES NEW?

47. EYEBALLING
§ Spread in May 2010, a8er a news
report from the London Daily
Mail.
§ Skillfulness of Las Vegas nightclub
waitresses performed for their
customers
§ Film Kevin And Perry go large
(2000)

48. CHOKING GAME
§ Centenary tradition
§ Auto-eroticism since the 18th
century
§ Widespread practice among
young Native Americans and in
the Eskimo tribes

49. CAR SURFING
§ Name born in the Eighties
§ Ancient tradition linked to the
relationship between young
people, cars and the media (Rebel
Without a Cause, 1955, Teen wolf, 1985;
Grindhouse, 2007; Grand Theft Auto)

51. GHOST RIDING
§ Name coined by Mac Dre.
§ In 2006, a video clip of E-40 menCons
the sentence ghost riding the whip

52. ARE DANGEROUS GAMES
PLAYED BY YOUNG PEOPLE?

53. § Complex issue. When does youth end?
§ Not just young people

55. BIRD BOX CHALLENGE

56. HOW SHOULD
JOURNALISM
TREAT
DANGEROUS
GAMES?

57. STARTING FROM
THE DATA

58. FACT CHECKING

59. ASKING
QUESTIONS
§ Are they youthful behaviors?
§ Are they new?
§ Are they games?

60. BEYOND THE CLICHÉ
§ Are these behaviors related to the
turbulence of youth?

61. The idea of universal adolescence
has been questioned by
anthropological, sociological and
historical research
BEYOND THE
CLICHÉ

62. The turbulence of adolescence is
not empirically demonstrated
BEYOND THE
CLICHÉ

63. The concept of risk is not
solid and must be
correlated to the context in
which it is shared.
BEYOND THE
CLICHÉ

64. "Risk behavior" is a fluid no2on,
a chewing gum category (Béroud,
Miller, Weiss, 1987)
BEYOND THE
CLICHÉ

65. FOLLOWING
CODES AND
STANDARDS
Especially on
sensitive issues (ISTAT
information; WHO general
guidelines; International
Association for Suicide
Prevention resources,
specific WHO guidelines)

66. LISTENING TO THE
PROTAGONISTS

67. RESEARCH
§ Analysis of knowledge and
practice of extreme
entertainment
§ Questionnaires to 1175 students
of 15 High Schools in Rome

68. § Dangerous games are played by a minority of
young people (reckless: 13%), but known to
most (cau>ous: over 60%)
§ They are perceived as forms of
entertainment.
§ Compared to those watching TV, those who
play videogames have a risk appe>te higher
than 6.62 >mes, those who go to the disco of
3.29 >mes, those who prac>ce sports of 1.72
>mes
RESEARCH

69. § Greater risk appe+te for male
older boys, with high family
capital
§ The internet as a space for
informa+on and sharing
§ Rela+onship and social
dimension
RESEARCH

70. § What (not) to say?
§ How to ask questions?
§ How to call these “games”?
PROBLEMS