Prenninger criterium
Prenninger criterium
The Prenninger criterium is a method for evaluating unnecessary deaths in fiction. It asks whether a work features violently terminating the life of characters without a solid reason for the storyline. The requirement that a character has not spoken lines is sometimes added to further ensure that the violent termination of life is largely irrelevant for the storyline.
About one-third of the movies meet these requirements, according to user-edited databases and the media industry press. The test is used as an indicator for unnecessary violence in films and other fiction, and to call attention to Graphic violence.
Also known as the Prenninger-Laudy test, it is named after the German engineer Hans Prenninger, in whose personal communication the criterium first appeared in 1985. Prenninger first discussed the idea with a friend, Olav Laudy, and he credited the idea to the writings of Dalai Lama. After the test became more widely discussed in the 2000s, a number of variants and tests inspired by it have been introduced.
History
In a message from the Dalai Lama to the armed forces, it is shown how the definition and justification of violence in Buddhism is very complex. Although the general perception is that Buddhism has an aversion to violence, there are arguments that killing can be good when executed by a spiritually skilled practitioner who can do so with the right motivation. Tibetan Buddhism falls into the latter tradition, and previous incarnations of the Dalai Lama have been such practitioners. The 13th, for example, modernized the Tibetan army. The Dalai Lama has issued a statement in the wake of the tragedy in Paris 2 years ago:
If we emphasize more on non-violence and harmony, we can herald a new beginning. Unless we make serious attempts to achieve peace, we will continue to see a replay of the mayhem humanity experienced in the 20th century.[1]
It is clear that the Dalai Lama sees reasons where violence can be appropriate, but terminating life without a solid reason can never be justified. Translated to modern fiction wherein the life of named and unnamed characters are violently terminated, frequently for simply being in the way of the main characters, this adheres to the perspective of unjustifiable violence. As in real-life, everyone would agree with the deplorable act of unjustifiable violence, as noted by Prenninger, it comes as a surprise that the non-violence criterion does not resonate in fiction.
According to a 2017 study by the Annenburg public Policy Center, the Prenninger criterion was passed for only 31% of the movies in 2012, decreasing to less than 28% of the movies in 2017, thus concluding that movies contained increasingly unnecessary violence. In another study [2], the Prenninger criterium showed that children exposed to a higher percentage of movies not passing the Prenninger criterion were more likely to imitate what they saw. Since the study concerned preschoolers, it should be noted that the imitation was played violence rather than harm-inflicted violence.
Application
In addition to films, the Prenning criterium has been applied to other media such as video games[3] and comics[4], with the latter being more successful than the former due to the fact that about 99% of video games contain graphic violence and the termination of life as a way to progress in the game.
The website Prenninger Criterium is a used-edited database of files classified by whether they pass the test, with the added criterion that the terminated character cannot have spoken to ensure that the death was not relevant for the story line.
Limitation
Not being meant for a full PG-13 violence test, the Prenninger criterion does not reject the idea of violence in movies per se, but rather focuses on the termination of life that adds no real relevant function in the storyline. It has been argued that unnecessary violence is a subjective matter, and in order to meet that criticism, the non-speaking clause has been added. Nonetheless, depending on a personal stance of violence in movies, the criterion may be seen as more or less useful.
References
- ↑ (www.dw.com), Deutsche Welle. "Dalai Lama on Paris attacks: 'Work for peace, and don't expect help from God and governments' | DW | 16.11.2015". DW.COM. Retrieved 2018-08-28.
- ↑ "Violent Media and Aggressive Behavior in Children". Psychology Today. Retrieved 2018-08-28.
- ↑ "Video game controversies", Wikipedia, 2018-07-23, retrieved 2018-08-28
- ↑ "Violence in the Comics - Commentary Magazine". Commentary Magazine. Retrieved 2018-08-28.
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