SOURCE: "Horror Comics: The Nasties of the 1950's," in History Today, Vol. 44, No. 7, July, 1994, pp. 10-13.

In the following essay, Springhall delves into Great Britain's 1950s campaign against crime and horror comics.

'Moral panic' occurs when the official or press reaction to a deviant social or cultural phenomenon is 'out of all proportion' to the actual threat offered, implying a periodic tendency towards the identification and scape-goating of agencies whose effects are regarded by hegemonic groups as indicative of imminent social breakdown. "Unparalleled evil and barbaric killers" says judge—but did horrific video nasty trigger James's murder?' queried a tabloid headline, rekindling the 'video nasty' debate the day after the conviction of two eleven-year-old boys for the murder in February 1993 of two-year-old James Bulger in Bootle, Merseyside. 'Moral panic' surfaced again in April this year, engendered by the rantings of the tabloid press and by Home Secretary...