See the Good Behind the Hood
See the Good Behind the Hood is a campaign run by the UK Youth Parliament (UKYP).[1] It aims to promote positive images of young people and combat the negative perceptions of youth common in the press and society.
History[edit]
"See the Good Behind the Hood" was elected as one of the UKYP's three West Midlands campaigns in March 2008, when the newly elected Members of Youth Parliament (MYPs) from around the county met for the first time and voted on their top three issues to campaign on in the upcoming year. The project is led by Dan Willetts, MYP for Dudley, and Andy Marlow, MYP for Birmingham.
On 15 November 2008, a campaign launch was held with a publicity stunt in central Birmingham, featuring a banner and five foam men. While they were up, they received a good response from passers-by. However, the men were kidnapped after a short period of time and, demoralised, nothing more was done that day.
Background[edit]
Currently, 88% of articles about young people are negative. However, numerous surveys into the issue have shown that the majority of young people are good. For example, Frontier Youth Trust, in research for its "labels r 4 jars not young people" campaign, found that the majority of adults overestimate teenage pregnancy rates and youth crime, despite the fact that the majority said they had not been intimidated by young people in the past year. This view was informed by the media in 61% of cases, while only 8% said they had regular contact with young people.
The British Youth Council's "Respect?"[2] campaign found that 90% of young people denounce anti-social behaviour and 98% felt that the media portrayed them as antisocial, which 80% believed made older generations respect them less.
The Prince's Trust found that less than 10% of young people carry knives, take drugs or join gangs.
The reasoning behind campaigning to improve the images of young people in the media is therefore simple: young people are being portrayed unfairly and inaccurately, and this is having a damaging effect on community cohesion, where old fear young, and young mistrust old.
Activities[edit]
The aim of the campaign is to improve the image of young people by increasing youth participation in the media. If frequent images of violence, drugs, anti-social behaviour and knife crime in the media cause such a negative view of youth, then increasing images of the good that young people do should go some way towards combating this negativity.
The campaign believes that fears between different groups are caused by misunderstanding, so if adults can understand the thoughts and actions of young people, the barriers will fall.
The campaign is looking at changing the Press Complaints Commission clause on discrimination, which currently neglects to mention youth.
The campaign is conducting a survey of young people's views in the West Midlands, which will be used to create a report on the issue of unfair representation in the press, which will be sent to leading politicians and media executives.
The campaign is in the process of filming a five-minute documentary, which will be shown on Community channel. Several local papers agreed to regular youth contributions, and there is the possibility of one in the Birmingham Mail.
References[edit]
External links[edit]
This article "See the Good Behind the Hood" is from Wikipedia. The list of its authors can be seen in its historical. Articles copied from Draft Namespace on Wikipedia could be seen on the Draft Namespace of Wikipedia and not main one.
