Should the media report on dangerous people who crave the attention?

Socially undesirable people sometimes commit taboo acts such as murder or rape in order to gain negative attention from the public. They may do deeds that shock the public because they enjoy the publicity.

What is the media’s responsibility in these situations? Should the media self-censor? Are the rules for mass media and bloggers different?

In NYC, most of the media outlets will now self-censor suicides, in order to avoid inspiration.

About 5 years ago, there were a string of suicides at the NYU library, by people jumping off the 8th floor balcony. The NY Post (aka the scumbag of scumbag newspapers) actually put a photo of a student falling mid-air on the front page! Every other news outlet in the city ripped them a new asshole.

I think they shouldn´t publish names and pictures of criminals unless it´s really vital to public interests.

It depends on how it’s done. I can see it being covered in a way that doesn’t encourage copycats. For example, and this is an old example, Reagan was shot to impress a movie star. From the coverage I’ve seen of that, it was covered in such a way that everyone realized how insane and stupid that was. So more people weren’t encouraged to go on a shooting spree to with a starletts love.

OTOH a lot of coverage of over the top protests seems somewhat fawning, or at last gives attention and encourages more of it. Code Pink, tea party, whatever. When they cross lines, perhaps the media should stop and ask if they need to cover that.

Temple of Artemis…arson…Herostratus…the question is nothing new, & cannot be resolved.