02-23-2018, 05:01 AM
There's a growing school of thought that sensationalized and never-ending news coverage is a great incentive to mass shooters. Kids who feel disconnected and invisible to the world understand that a way to become visible is through a body count. The media will run the story until they extract every last piece of emotion, income and political advantage. The shooter becomes a household name. A couple of psychologists say that the desire of fame or infamy is a common bond of these murderers and they've labeled the behavior of the news as Media Contagion. You can read a brief article here. https://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/...agion.aspx
The Newtown shooter took this to new heights. From the book The War on Guns by Dr. John Lott (pg 125): ...the Newtown killer, spent two-and-one-half putting together a report on mass public shootings. Law enforcement described "A sickeningly thorough 7-foor long, 4-foot wide spreadsheet with names, body counts, and weapons from previous mass murders and even attempted killings. 'I sounded like a doctoral thesis, that was the quality of the research,' an anonymous law enforcement veteran said." Lanza also collected information on media coverage for each killing. He observed that attacks with more deaths received greater media coverage...Take this report from CBS Evening News:
Sources say Lanza saw himself as being in direct competition with Anders Breivik, a Norwegian man who killed in July 2011...Two officials who have been briefed on the Newtown, Conn. investigation say Lanza wanted to top Breivik's death toll...
It sounds like the 1st, not the 2nd Amendment is at work here. Perhaps we should ban showing these murderer's faces or mentioning their names. There is some precedent for this. From the Atlantic:
You might not have noticed, but the mass media rarely reports on suicides, particularly teen suicides. When it does, the coverage is careful, understated, and dampened. This is no accident: Following guidelines endorsed by the Centers for Disease Control and National Institutes of Mental Health, the media carefully and voluntarily avoids sensationalizing such deaths especially among teenagers. They almost never make the news unless the person is a public figure; methods of suicide are rarely mentioned; suicide pacts are not reported upon.
This is for good reason: Suicide, especially among teens, is contagious. It's a morbidly attractive idea that offers an established path of action for a troubled youngster. And we know from research in many fields that establishing a path of action -- a complete narrative in which you can visualize your steps and their effects -- is important in enabling follow-through.
The Newtown shooter took this to new heights. From the book The War on Guns by Dr. John Lott (pg 125): ...the Newtown killer, spent two-and-one-half putting together a report on mass public shootings. Law enforcement described "A sickeningly thorough 7-foor long, 4-foot wide spreadsheet with names, body counts, and weapons from previous mass murders and even attempted killings. 'I sounded like a doctoral thesis, that was the quality of the research,' an anonymous law enforcement veteran said." Lanza also collected information on media coverage for each killing. He observed that attacks with more deaths received greater media coverage...Take this report from CBS Evening News:
Sources say Lanza saw himself as being in direct competition with Anders Breivik, a Norwegian man who killed in July 2011...Two officials who have been briefed on the Newtown, Conn. investigation say Lanza wanted to top Breivik's death toll...
It sounds like the 1st, not the 2nd Amendment is at work here. Perhaps we should ban showing these murderer's faces or mentioning their names. There is some precedent for this. From the Atlantic:
You might not have noticed, but the mass media rarely reports on suicides, particularly teen suicides. When it does, the coverage is careful, understated, and dampened. This is no accident: Following guidelines endorsed by the Centers for Disease Control and National Institutes of Mental Health, the media carefully and voluntarily avoids sensationalizing such deaths especially among teenagers. They almost never make the news unless the person is a public figure; methods of suicide are rarely mentioned; suicide pacts are not reported upon.
This is for good reason: Suicide, especially among teens, is contagious. It's a morbidly attractive idea that offers an established path of action for a troubled youngster. And we know from research in many fields that establishing a path of action -- a complete narrative in which you can visualize your steps and their effects -- is important in enabling follow-through.
Paul Peloquin
Did government credibility die of Covid or with Covid?
Did government credibility die of Covid or with Covid?