Moral Panic

Artifacts in these display cases highlight games, photos, statues and other items that are related to well-documented Moral Panics, as defined by Jock Young and Stanley Cohen:

• Moral panics are instances of mass fear based on the false or exaggerated perception that some cultural behavior or group of people is dangerously deviant and poses a threat to society's values and interests.
• Such panics are fostered by mass media and exploited by self-appointed moralists and politicians.

For example, Dungeons & Dragons became a target of moral panic in the Satanic Panic of the 1980s to 1990s, as is shown in the newspaper clippings.

Exhibit Activities - Conspiracy Theory MAD LIBS

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Download one of the Conspiracy Theory Mad Libs: MAD LIB #1, MAD LIB #2
2. One player asks the other players to contribute a word of the specified type for each blank, but without revealing the context for that word.
3. Read the (hopefully) hilarious & nonsensical conspiracy theory aloud.

Exhibit Activities - Folk Devils from Your Childhood

INSTRUCTIONS

What music, movies, or fashion trends were controversial when you were young?