moral panic

moral panic, phrase used in sociology to describe an artificially created panic or scare. Researchers, often influenced by critical conflict-oriented Marxist themes, have demonstrated that moral entrepreneurs have demonized “dangerous groups” to serve their own religious, political, economic, social, cultural, and legal interests. Although the aims, forms, dynamics, and outcomes of moral panics vary throughout history, they have, with isolated exceptions, been initiated by powerful interest groups to manage the bodies and behavior of threatening groups—often, the poor and powerless.

Some examples of moral panics can be found in 20th century US history. They were driven by race, religion, politics, and economics. The passage of the Mann Act in 1910—federal legislation prohibiting the transportation of females across state lines for immoral purposes—was, in large part, introduced to prohibit “white slavery,” or the sexual exploitation of white women (i.e., forcing them into prostitution). It was later used to also prosecute African-American men for having sexual contact with white women, even if the woman was the man’s girlfriend or wife. The 1919–20 Red Scare and Palmer raids, which resulted in the arrest of thousands of suspected socialists, communists, and anarchists, was a product of fears of political revolution following the Russian Revolution of 1917. During the 1950s, Americans were consumed with the threat posed by Russia and the cold war. The McCarthy hearings—in retrospect, a modern witch hunt—were, in many ways, a continuation of the Red Scare.