This rant may not appear very Conservative, but it cannot be denied that it is a comment. Last Friday, I went to see the new Batman film with friends. It was a very good film, but the controversy has been raging over the certificate that it was given, a 12A. For the benefit of all, this rating means that anyone can see this film in the cinema, so long as if they are under 12, they are accompanied by an adult.
I have seen reviews bemoaning the quantity of violence in the film, drawing comments about desensitising the young and impressionable to violence, to the end that in the eyes of the reviewer, Batman should have been given a 15 because of the harmful effect it could have on the young.
Yet precious little violence was shown on camera, it was all implied off-camera by the behaviour of the actors. So young people are not viewing much violence in the film; most of the violent acts are skilfully implied in the mind of the audience.
Anyway, we don't need fictional worlds to see violence. Scarcely a week goes past without news of a fatal stabbing/shooting, so in many ways, the real world that we live in contains violence, which is all the more scary because it is real.
People attribute the rise in violence to these films, but as any statistician should know, an observed pattern does not necessarily imply causation. It is my opinion that young people are involved in violence because they feel intrinsically insecure in themselves, and so carry knives to appear more confident. But with more knives on the street, it stands to reason that there will be more knife incidents, as I am convinced that there is a causal link between more knives and knife crime. My diagnosis does not, please note, more knives on the streets because Heath Ledger, in a spirited performance, expresses a preference for knives over other means of killing, for instance. Films have little to do with the situation.
Having said that, it remains clear that some films are intrinsically unsuitable for children of a certain age. For instance, even though Batman was a 12A, I would refuse to take anyone younger than 12 to see it, as I believe that it is unsuitable for that age group. In which case, in my eyes, it might as well be a 12. To mitigate this problem, I propose removing the 12A classification, and instead, if a film warrants a 12A classification, the censors should upgrade the rating to a 12. For the reasons to do with violence outlined above, a 15 would be overreacting, in my opinion.
As I feel that the English young person's inherent insecurity is to be blamed for increased violence, we have two options. To use stop and search powers to confiscate knives and guns much more than they are currently being used, or to give young people a sense of purpose. That is, to get them into employment, or a full-time college course, and keep them busy at something that would benefit them (financially or through qualifications). I would therefore recommend increasing the policing powers and/or budget, to reduce the problem itself, and then to significantly increase the number of Apprenticeship schemes through financial inducements for businesses, to tackle the root causes of the problem. As Stolypin, Prime Minister of Russia 1906-11 said:
Repression, and then, only then, reform."
To do one without the other would only be half a job.
To conclude, it is wildly inaccurate to blame films and the censors for violence in the world today. The censors are merely interpreting guidelines, and in any case, the proliferation of ridiculously violent games such as "Grand Theft Auto" and "Manhunt" are much more legitimate targets for this claim than a film with little on-screen violence that only uses up 2.5 hours of a person's life. The root cause of the problem, as always, is insecurity, the need to appear strong and aggressive to bluster one's way through life. So a two-pronged strategy: remove the instruments of violence from the streets, and tackle this insecurity problem by getting people involved in worthwhile jobs to the benefit of all.
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