Extract
The Oprahization of America: Sympathetic Crime Talk and Leniency.
A common contention holds that Americans have gone soft on crime (Austin, 1995; Leo, 1994). Jurors seem increasingly unable to render guilty verdicts even in cases where the evidence for the commission of the offense by the accused appears compelling (Dershowitz, 1994; Dorfman & Iijima, 1995; Goldberg, 1994; Price, 1994). Such compassion for criminal wrongdoers has been attributed to a growing understanding of motives that could explain transgressive actions. Leo suggests that "we are deep into the era of abuse excuse" (1994, p. 17). He speaks of a doctrine of victimology that grants criminals victim-status which then absolves them from responsibility for their crimes. Defense attorneys, he argues, dwell on the offender's history of abuse of any kind, thereby converting the offender's status to that of a victim. The sympathy created for the offender then diminishes and potentially overpowers the weight of evidence against the offender. Commenting on this phenomenon, the noted legal scholar Alan Dershowitz has acknowledged that jurors have become sensitive to a point where they "are beginning to behave like social workers" (cited in Leo, 1994, p. 17).
This new and apparently growing sensitivity of jurors has been attributed to media influence. The Oprah Winfrey Show has been singled out as the prototype. Oprah Winfrey is frequently credited with extraordinary empathic skills in extracting self-disclosures and gut-wrenching confessions from her guests (Abelman, 1998; Abt & Mustazza, 1997; Priest, 1995). Nonconfrontational self-disclosure has become the trademark of her show --to a point that Krauthammer (1992)has characterized the apparent increase in self-revelations among politicians as an Oprahtization (sic) of politics. Focusing on Oprah's sympathetic and understanding treatment of "wronged wrongdoers," Dershowitz (1994) claimed the Oprahization of the law (and took credit for coining that phrase). Sandel (1997) cited attorneys who labeled the apparent punitive reluctance of jurors as Oprahization of sentencing. Such characterizations derive from the fact that Oprah Winfrey employs her "human warmth" in her interviews of guests who are presented as having suffered neglect and abuse, including the trauma of purported miscarriages of justice. More than the hosts of competing talk shows, Oprah Winfrey shows profound sympathy for the allegedly wronged and probes for causes of their...See the full content of this document
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