Solution to USA Mass shootings

Great Debates
1

As noted sociologists and other experts have proved- it’s not the guns, it’s the media. The media glorifying the shooters is what has caused the large uptick in mass shooting in this century.

As I showed over in the elections thread about O’Rourke:
https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=882156&page=2

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-...research-shows

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/b...rJRTObuojybVyc
*The second dose came as I held my breath, hoping and praying the media wouldn’t amplify the violence.

But they did.

They did exactly what was needed to influence the next perpetrator to lock and load.

  1. They named the shooter.
  2. They described his characteristics.
  3. They detailed the crime.
  4. They numbered the victims.
  5. They ranked him against other “successful” attackers.

School shootings are a contagion. And the media are consistent accomplices in most every one of them.

There’s really no useful debate on the point. The consensus of social scientists since David Phillips’ groundbreaking work in 1974 is that highly publicized stories of deviant and dangerous behavior influences copycat incidents.*

https://www.elon.edu/u/academics/com...HzwQqHI2r9fjYM
This study suggests that there is a pattern
between the spread of mass shooting news on social media platforms and the increase in these crimes. Over
time, as social media has increased in usage, so has the coverage of news concerning mass shootings. This
also further reflects shooters’ desire for fame and their tendency to copy a crime.
Evidence from this study reveals a large increase in the number of mass shootings after 2011’s social
media milestones, and one can conclude that social media most likely has some effect on these crimes,
although the degree of this relationship is beyond the scope of this study.

http://www.center4research.org/copy-...M3lsW1yXPMrEQ8
*Shooters get enormous attention: their name, photo, motivations, and story are often shared for days following the event. The American Psychological Association points out that this “fame” is something that most mass shooters desire.[2] This sometime inspires a copycat shooting, where the potential shooter typically tries to kill more people than their predecessor.

The number of mass shootings in the U.S. has increased exponentially since the early 2000s*

However, we can cut back the number of shootings without tearing up the 1st Ad.

  1. Broadcast Media doesnt have unlimited 1st Ad protection. We banned tobacco ads, we can get them to agree to not broadcast the names, etc of the shooters. Show them the stick and the carrot, let them agree to do this under threat of having it forced on them. They can even use it to show “they care”. Fine. Broadcast media is the problem.

  2. Print Media may well go along to some extent, like they now do with not printing the names of rape victims. Encourage them. Some wont, but that’s OK.

See- and in one stroke we cuts back the number of mass shootings to pre-2000 levels. Certainly far more than any Constitutional gun control measures would do, anyway.

Not that some gun controls measures, like banning the SALE of ‘assault weapons’, more background checks and “red flag” laws wont help some.

2

The existence of social media would completely undercut this approach. It would be absolutely ineffective; the information would still get out, and the shooters would still get all the fame they desire.

Based on the timing of things, I have a suspicious that the rise of shootings was largely caused by in social media and the corresponding ‘validation through fleeting attention’ that came with it.

3

Are you sure you know the meaning of the word “glorifying”?

4

Every non-SDMB link in the OP is broken for me, and it makes me laugh that the OP suggests that the First Amendment needs to be further limited to suit his near-unlimited view of the Second Amendment.

Are there any other laws that should be offered up as ritual sacrifices to guns?

5

So what is your solution then? We all just collectively stop talking about mass shootings? Close our eyes, put our fingers in our ears and yell nana I can’t hear you? Something like that? Is this called the head in the sand technique? Do you really think if we just ignore the problem it will magically go away?

I’m really curious to hear what your actual solution is, in practical terms. Like how would we start right now? Lay out the steps for us like this:

  1. ignore the problem, outlaw discussing these actual events that are happening?
  2. ???
  3. problem solved, no more mass shootings?
6

Well, while you and I might consider that being named in a news report is not glorification, to the perpetrator it certainly is glorification.

7

It probably actually would make a difference, if all coverage of the incidents could be eliminated. The drastic uptick of mass shootings was caused by something, after all, and it wasn’t a sudden surge in the availability of guns. And a lot of mass shooters clearly are doing it either for attention or to send a message.

It wouldn’t fix all the problems, of course, because surely a significant factor in the uptick has been the racist in chief and his party of traitors spurring on their electorate towards hatred of The Other. But it would probably help some, if we could prevent anybody from hearing about them.

Of course that’s all moot because there’s no way to get the internet back into the bottle. There’s no way to stop these people from having a good chance at internet fame for their actions, so a different approach would have to be taken if we actually cared to do something. (I lean towards disarming them, myself.)

8

Do you know what “broadcast media” is and how much of the media market it controls? By the way-from what article did you get all those broken links?

9

Pun somewhat intended, but the OP is suggesting “shooting the messenger”?

That we have a rather old, rather apt, and somewhat derogatory expression about that concept should be telling.

10

When better than Constitution Day to discuss gutting one amendment to shore up another, right?

11

So we must act on our suspicions and deprive potential shooters of one possible motivating factor by shitting on the First Amendment and ignore the real issue, the availability of guns, by hiding behind the skirt of the Second Half Of The Second Amendment.

12

DrDeth, I just want to clarify, do you feel mass shootings uniquely require a solution, where other forms of gun violence don’t? As in, mass shootings are bad, but other shootings aren’t?

Because it seems to me that probably THE BEST way to solve the problem of mass shootings is to solve the wider problem of shootings in general. With that said, while I can see how your idea of controlling the media narrative might well result in some reduction in mass/spree-killings by people who want to make statement, it would seem to have significant drawbacks. The two foremost being (as others have noted) the impracticality of so completely controlling the narrative when there are so many outlets available for information (as long as there is a market for details, details WILL get out: nature finds a way), and the whole thing about the first amendment.

13

I arrive at this gathering extremely skeptical, given that we are convened by someone calling emself DOCTOR DEATH! :dubious:

14

First, assuming for argument’s sake the OP is correct, Ravenman has the right question – why impinge on the First Amendment because the Second Amendment is causing problems?

Second, it simply cannot be the case that it’s all the glorification causing the uptick, since other countries with free press, but more restrictive gun laws, don’t have this problem.

Third, gun availability may not have gone up recently, but gun ownership (number of guns owned, not necessarily the number of gun owners) has certainly gone up. Cite: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2018/06/19/there-are-more-guns-than-people-in-the-united-states-according-to-a-new-study-of-global-firearm-ownership. NRA spending has gone up tremendously as well.

Fourth, while the US is an outlier in terms of mass shootings, it’s also very much an outlier in terms of overall shootings. If you can figure out a way to solve the second, and much, much bigger problem, it will no doubt help with the first. That is, mass shootings is not really a problem, statistically, in the US – several hundred people per year, compared to the tens of thousands of people routinely killed by guns here.

So, don’t curtail First Amendment rights in order to try and solve a statistical non-issue like mass shootings. Rather, find ways to get guns away from people likely to use them on other people (fix the general shootings issue) and mass shootings will likely decline as well.

15

I looked up this study. It appears to be from an undergraduate in the School of Communications from a university that doesn’t seem particularly noteworthy. Link – scroll down to the part about intern biographies to see the author (Ms. Lee) background. One should also check out her other internship experience – I’m not going to mock her for it, as those are perfectly respectable endeavors, but they are quite far afield from psychology, sociology, criminology, etc.

Is this your version of a “noted sociologist?”

On the other hand, check out this study, funded by the National Institutes of Justice and headed by two PhDs, one in psychology and one in sociology. Both appear to have background in criminology. Link.

Number 3 touches on how assailants seek validation from wherever they can, as opposed to saying that the media is being reckless in letting people know about murders.

More importantly, note number 4 – that’s about access to guns, which completely destroys your underlying point that guns have nothing to do with mass shootings (an absurdity on its face, of course).

16

The problem, as always, is a “What’s in it for us?” syndrome.

The mainstream media has a choice whenever some gunman does a Pulse, Virginia Tech or Sandy Hook: They can forego the clicks, revenue, views and ratings and $$$$$…all the while knowing that their competitors will simply air the news and get the revenue that they’re missing out on…or they can just fall for the forbidden fruit and do their sobbing routine for money and eyeballs.

For the media execs, it’s an easy choice.

17

How could the media not report those things?! They’re all newsworthy points – the media wouldn’t be doing their job if they didn’t report them. When a media outlet has a policy not to report something about a crime, it is typically to protect the victims, i.e., rape and molestation victims – the public doesn’t need to know their names.

18

Be that as it may, it’s giving killers exactly what they want.

Suppose you have an aggrieved white supremacist who feels that blacks are the cause of all his problems. He knows for a fact that if he shoots up a black wedding or block party or whatever, and kills dozens, and first publishes a manifesto, that the following things will happen:

His name and photo will be emblazoned everywhere. The media will report in-depth on his manifesto, poring over every single one of his paragraphs with a fine comb. He will become a household name, Googling him will get millions of hits, the President of the United States will be talking about him in a national address, every politician will be talking about him, all of his grievances will be carefully read, absorbed, thought about and pondered by numerous readers, thousands of people will be converted to his way of thinking, he will get thousands of fans on the Internet, there will be T-shirts with his face on them, there will be a Wikipedia page about him, possibly entire books will be written about him, maybe even a movie made one day about his shooting…how can that be anything other than the most potent catnip to such a KKK-er?
The only thing he’d lament while alive would be that he wouldn’t be around to see it for himself. (Unless he plans to be taken alive by police instead of shooting himself in the head)

19

If only the media would only report what conservatives want them to report and keep everything else secret, huh?

That seems to be the nonstop theme during the Trump era.

Also completely ridiculous, impossible, and at total odds with the first amendment and with having an informed public, which are both essential for a healthy democracy.

20

So do lax gun laws which let these guys have the weapons they need to carry out these atrocities. However those we have some control over. We do not have control over what the news reports as they are here to report the news. Dictatorships control the media. Is that what you are advocating? Otherwise how do you plan to control every news outlet as well as every human with a social media account? Please give your detailed plan on how you suggest this is carried out.

Again, please lay out your plan to control every media outlet as well as every American with twitter, facebook etc. and not have us be North Korea. How exactly is that supposed to happen?