Do ‘Kidulthood’ and ‘Fish Tank’ create a realistic representation of youth?

Kidulthood (written by Noel Clarke) and Fish Tank (written by Andrea Arnold) are both ‘2k’ films involving youths and their struggles in today’s society.

Stuart Hall proposes that the media, as a principle from of ideological spreading, produces representations of the social world via images and portrayals. Hall asserts that ideological things become ‘naturalised’. The way youths behave and act have changed, arguably for the worst, but have mostly been portrayed in a negative light by the media. If we look at 1950s ‘Rebel Without A Cause’, James Dean’s only rebel-like actions are smoking, popping his collar and an occasional fight. Youths in Kidulthood are seen fighting with knives and guns, taking drugs, having sex and swearing constantly throughout. This shows that youths are becoming more violent. However, we are so used to it, we have become desensitised as Stuart Hall explained and because of this, it can be argued that Kidulthood and Fishtank do create a realistic view of youths.

Print media, especially tabloids, generally represent youths as violent, unintelligent and delinquents. The Sun continuously mock youths, by calling them “yobs” and “thugs” and even go as far as pointing out which race caused the most trouble which can be read in their article “I predict a rioter” (Oct 25, 2011). The article gives their readers estimated percentages, debatably exaggerated, on the type of people that were in the riots and heavily implying who members of the public should avoid, as if they were helping the public. Print media such as The Sun tend to thrive on generating moral panic to sell their papers and almost control what readers should think and how we should act. If we all followed what the media told us, we would end up living in a Marxist society whereby the social order of things will be governed by the media (Karl Marx). This post-modernistic view of youths created by the print media does match the representations both ‘2k’ films show also.

David Buckingham says, “A focus on identity requires us to pay closer attention to the ways in which media and technologies are used in everyday life and their consequences for social groups”. Technology is used by so many youths to interact, organise things and be social. However, it can be used to create anarchy, demonstrated in the London 2011 Riots where rioters were arranging riots via Facebook, Twitter and Blackberry Messenger (BBM). During the riots, BBM was shut down temporarily in an attempt to help stop the mass rioting and even Twitter was threatened to be taken down. Similarly, the youths in Kidulthood used their phones to communicate with each other, meet up and cause chaos. On the other hand, the main character in Fish Tank didn’t seem to be all social on her mobile phone or other technology.

The main character in Fish Tank, despite not being social technologically, was depicted as a stereotypical and archetypal teenager. Henri Tajfel said that individuals strive to improve their self-image by trying to enhance their self-esteem, based on their personal identity or various social identities which results in ‘in’ and ‘out’ groups. The main character of Fish Tank is seen as the ‘out’ group because she isn’t like the other young females in the film, who are seen trying to impress boys in the beginning with their dancing. However, the main character does actually want to be able to dance and be a part of that ‘in’ group. There are many types of groups viewed as ‘in’ and ‘out’ groups among today’s youths and this illustrates it and so this does represent youth realistically.

Winship’s notion of complexity is about being prepared, in terms of audience gratification, to finally recognise the ideal version of ourselves. If we look at today’s music videos by such artists as Rihanna and Temper T, we can see that their audiences are made up of many youths. When youths watch music videos such as these, their identities mediate as they are represented with what they think is an ideal version of a young male and female, as Winship’s notion suggests, and may see these people as role models to follow. Rihanna’s videos promote things of the sexual nature while violence is being glorified by Temper T’s videos. These videos can easily influence youths as they attempt to find their identity (David Gauntlett). Continuous promotion of sex and violence being exposed to youths without much regulation, is an indication that youths are alike the portrayals by Kidulthood and Fish Tank.

In conclusion, a range of media products display their views of youths and even change them but youths have been seen overall as negative. This matches the representations of youths seen in ‘2k’ films, Kidulthood and Fish Tank. In the future, youths may become worse and as the media covers it and films are made about it, we may become desensitised even further and not realise how bad things are for youths.