Aestheticization of Fear and Violence via Public Relations

Abstract

Fear is a human emotion that allows a person to survive. It has a function to ensure the continuity of life. The definition of fear has changed over time. Along with human development, transition to sedentary life, the industrial revolution, and modern life, fear and the things feared have changed. Fear has started to be marketed, especially in post-industrial societies. The governments have seen that fear and violence work to regulate, control, and passivate people. Political governments have had the unique opportunity to use fear as a mechanism for control and surveillance. The governments have aestheticized the fear and presented it indirectly with the support of media. The masses have been shaped as weak, scared, anxious, and helpless in the shadow of fear and violence. This study tries to shed light on the attempt to persuade the society about the legitimacy of the military government by presenting fear and violence to people in aestheticized forms in the 1980s in Turkey.