Kill the Cat Killers: Moral Panic and Juvenile Crime in Slovenia

Abstract

Through the concept of moral panic, the author analyzes public reactions to three high school boys from Tržič, Slovenia, who were accused of killing more than forty cats in March 2000. The author uses discourse analysis to interpret newspaper articles and television reports and to examine the nature of quotes offered by state agents and experts. The analysis is based on the constructionist paradigm and focuses on the claim makers rather than the behavior and people defined as deviant. The author emphasizes the considerable role of the mass media, experts, interest groups, and popular myths in the emergence of the moral panic. He argues that moral panics regarding youth function as a symptom of broader ideological struggles between different discourses and regulative practices. He suggests the way the concept should be used in the East European context in the light of economic, sociopolitical, and cultural changes that took place there.