To penetrate the issue about fear culture, one must discuss the drivers for this. The interest from media is of course very much a commercial one. Fear is one of the favorite headline words, used in every possible angle. Fear will attract more listeners, viewers, readers and then also the advertisers. It is also quite common to repeat the fear story and get it into a day-to-day news item. There must be a checklist somewhere in journalists manuals. Fx. start with an incident, follow-up with some scary facts, then with some connected stories and so on. In Barry Glassner's "Culture of fear" he is doing sociologic descriptions of several of these scares in US. One common feature is that there should be a "independent expert" that is willing to deliver all kinds of twisted facts. These experts are frequently self-made and misuse their scientific status, like reputation or referrals.
But what kind of economical interest has government in fear business? In Sweden has it been common to use arguments for having a warfare industry in the sense that we are neutral and should not be dependent on other nations technology. And since warfare industry is very expensive. we need to export our products. But now FRA needs to buy computers for billions of Swedish kronor. Only costs, as far as I can see? Or will we make analysis of Internet traffic and sell this to foreign intelligence services?
Again, I must draw some parallells with the macro (state/society) and micro (personal/family) perspectives. I read yesterday that more and more people fear burglery in their homes. The statistics are quite clear, though, it has been going down for the last 15 years. Despite this, security companies thrive, convincing people to buy even more advanced equipment. Can it be like that? that our politicians living in their homes, that they like to feel secure and therefore buy expensive gear for protection?
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