AN ANALYSIS OF THE DISCUSSION OF THE PENALTY REDUCTION ON THE POLICE TELEJOURNAL
Police news report; Majority; Criminal age; Criminalization.
The reduction of the criminal majority has become an urgent discussion in society, especially after the admissibility and approval of several PECs aimed at the criminal responsibility of adolescents. It is noteworthy that the proposals favorable to the reduction of the penal age subsequently emerge the occurrence of crimes that reach great national repercussion and public commotion. Thus, the police television journalism plays a prominent role in the spectacularization of the infraction committed by adolescents and indicate the decrease of the age of criminal responsibility as a solution for juvenile crime. Among the police news programs, Cidade Alerta stands out as part of the daily lives of the Brazilian population since 1995 and still reach high ratings. It is emphasized that this kind of television news is responsible for the dissemination of punitive ideals that favors adherence to the reduction of the penal age. It is precisely the discourse on the reduction of the criminal majority that particularly interests this research project that will start from the content of the reports about adolescents authors of infractions that are transmitted on the website of the police news channel Cidade Alerta. Therefore, the present research has as general objective: to analyze the discourse on the reduction of the criminal age in the police news report. In addition to the specific objectives, such as: characterize the adolescents authors of the infraction acts exposed in the reports; Identify the causes attributed to the infraction and the solutions presented to reduce the violence, as well as investigate the arguments used to defend the reduction of the penal age. To compose the corpus of this research, we selected thirty-two videos of reports on teenage authors of the infractions that were transmitted during the year 2015. Then the transcription and the analysis of the reports were carried out in the light of thematic categories. In general, it was noticed that the news report reproduces punitive selectivity by prioritizing the exposure of black and poor adolescents as perpetrators of violence. In addition to promoting the criminalization of poverty, by directing the punitive clamor to this public.