Popular culture and moral panic: From comics to video nasties

From the 1930’s onward, increasing concern was expressed at the negative influence of some types of comic available in New Zealand. In the mid-1980’s, a similar debate emerged over video censorship, with concern focusing on “video nasties”. This paper examines the comics and video debates in an attempt to show a convergence of the two episodes. My main argument is twofold: firstly, each episode constitutes a moral panic, in that the generally professed reasons for concern over both comics and video are either contestable or unsubstantiated; secondly, these surface issues have concealed more significant issues.