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Virginia Journalist Shooting: The Media needs to clean the blood off its own hands
Gun Watch ^ | 29 August, 2015 | Dean Weingarten

Posted on 08/30/2015 5:06:07 AM PDT by marktwain



Before the bodies were buried, the old media and other proponents of ever more restrictions on the Second Amendment were using the deaths to promote their political agenda.  They piously fail to mention their own responsibility.

The "Copycat Effect" is a well known and researched phenomena.  Endless promotion of these tragic events and the publicity given to the perpetrators is far more of a causal factor than the Second Amendment.

We have known for decades that it is media attention that is the driving motivation for most of these public mass shooters.

The copycat effect has been demonstrated and documented over and over again.  Clayton Cramer wrote a paper on this in 1993.   It was published in a the Journal of Mass Media Ethics, 9:1 [Winter 1993-94].  It won First Place, Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication Ethics Prize, 1993, Undergraduate Division.

It has been widely written about in other publications, such as the Wall Street Journal.   A book, The Copycat Effect, by Loren Coleman, was written in 2004.

It detailed simple strategies for mitigating the effect and reducing the number of these mass public killings.   They could be implemented without any significant chilling effect on the first amendment.    The AP could simply include these requirements in its writers guidelines.

The Cramer article has been around for 20 years, and won a prize for ethics.  The book by Coleman has been available for over a decade.  Any thoughtful person can see the obvious connection between making anti-heros of public shooters and the potential to tip unbalanced people over the edge, into an act that they see as immortalizing their otherwise miserable lives.

It is clear that the media would rather keep their power to use these events push for more restrictive gun laws than prevent innocents from being murdered.  As Cramer noted, the coverage of school shooting is at least 8 times as large at that of similar mass homicides that do not involve guns.

In a strange twist, the old media actually benefit financially from these shootings:  Newtown Media Buys.

When media personalities try to pressure candidates to push for more restrictive gun laws, as happened recently with Dr. Carson, candidates should push back by asking why the media continues to promote public shootings for their own benefit. 


©2015 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.  Link to Gun Watch


TOPICS: Government; History; Politics; Society
KEYWORDS: banglist; copycateffect; journalistshooting; media; vesterleeflanagan; virginia
When I have pushed back at the media with this, they shut up, stammer, and try to change the subject.
1 posted on 08/30/2015 5:06:07 AM PDT by marktwain
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To: marktwain

ABC is hiding the racist black killer’s ‘manifesto’.


2 posted on 08/30/2015 5:15:42 AM PDT by Godebert
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To: Godebert

That is because he idolizes all the other shooters


3 posted on 08/30/2015 5:28:00 AM PDT by teeman8r (Armageddon won't be pretty, but it's not like it's the end of the world.)
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To: marktwain

Bernard Goldberg’s book “Bias” opens with the following quote from Steven Brill: “When it comes to arrogance, power, and lack of accountability, journalists are probably the only people on the planet who make lawyers look good”.

I’d dare say the above applies to this and many other instances involving the media and their antics.


4 posted on 08/30/2015 6:02:40 AM PDT by OttawaFreeper ("Keeping your stick down used to be a commandment, but not anymore" Harry Sinden, 1988)
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To: marktwain

What I have been saying for years.


5 posted on 08/30/2015 6:03:39 AM PDT by I want the USA back (Media: completely irresponsible. Complicit in the destruction of this country)
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To: marktwain

In his anti-gun press appearances, Miss Parker’s father doesn’t mention that the murderer of his daughter purchased a gun legally and nothing he proposes would have kept Flanagan from buying the weapon.


6 posted on 08/30/2015 6:34:33 AM PDT by txrefugee
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To: marktwain

the media have a lot of blood on their hands. They have been inciting violence against cops and white people for the last 3 years. Actually, it’s been a lot longer than that, it’s just that they have made it a 24/7 job for them since the Martin case. We have seen numerous, mainly white, cops murdered by blacks, and numerous white civilians, including the two reporters.

You would think that such violence would cause the media to do some soul-searching, and engage in some reflection upon what they are doing, but no, they haven’t missed a beat in all their anti-white race-baiting and their anti-cop rhetoric. They are completely soulless.


7 posted on 08/30/2015 6:47:10 AM PDT by euram
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To: euram

The media has a lot of blood on their hands.


8 posted on 08/30/2015 6:51:37 AM PDT by sport
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To: txrefugee

They always leave out certain facts.


9 posted on 08/30/2015 6:53:00 AM PDT by sport
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To: txrefugee
In his anti-gun press appearances, Miss Parker’s father

He was on CNN again this morning, preaching to the choir. I wonder how much CNN is paying him.

He said something about some restraining order or restraining legislation needs to be imposed. Even Tapper was like, 'huh?'

Now, the big push is to 'keep weapons out of the hands of the mentally ill.' Libs are the ones who, over the years, have beat down such laws as being unfair and biased against the mentally ill. Libs try to have it both ways. Has there EVER been a Lib idea that turned out to be a good idea?
10 posted on 08/30/2015 6:57:28 AM PDT by TomGuy
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To: marktwain

Rule number one for our “New Age of Yellow Journalism” is;

“If it bleeds, it leads”


11 posted on 08/30/2015 7:05:15 AM PDT by fella ("As it was before Noah so shall it be again,")
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To: marktwain
That is because he idolizes all the other shooters

Bingo! And knew them by name even if he couldn't spell them correctly.

Seriously, this guy knew all the tricks of making sure his message got out - 1) video yourself doing the shooting, 2) send a rambling ill-thought manifesto that was obviously premeditated to a major news outlet, 3) post video and comments on social media.

Vester did everything but give a shout-out to Lee Harvey Oswald in his diatribe to make SURE he got his 15 minutes of fame.

Who could watch either video and not feel like you were watching a made-for-tv movie? It's because America has fantasized about lone gunmen since 1963 and that tv staple, the pretty innocent blonde as victim just cinches the deal.

I'm waiting for the movie to appear on the Lifetime Network which exists to scare the crap out of women to never, ever trust a man even while pining for "true love" with one.

12 posted on 08/30/2015 7:15:27 AM PDT by OrangeHoof (SECEDE TEXAS!! If not now, when?)
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To: marktwain
In a strange twist, the old media actually benefit financially from these shootings: Newtown Media Buys.

As always, follow the money. The key phrase: [the shooting] "led to a massive uptick in federal lobbying—a boon for K Streeters on both sides of the debate."

13 posted on 08/30/2015 7:29:14 AM PDT by Oatka (This is America. Assimilate or evaporate. [URL=http://media.photobucket.com/user/currencyjunkie/me)
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To: marktwain
In a strange twist, the old media actually benefit financially from these shootings: Newtown Media Buys.

As always, follow the money. The key phrase: [the shooting] "led to a massive uptick in federal lobbying—a boon for K Streeters on both sides of the debate."

A book, The Copycat Effect, by Loren Coleman, was written in 2004.
It detailed simple strategies for mitigating the effect and reducing the number of these mass public killings. They could be implemented without any significant chilling effect on the first amendment. The AP could simply include these requirements in its writers guidelines.

I wondered what those strategies were, and, once again, the Internet came through (I plan to cut and paste for any comments to newspapers who push the anti-gun line):

From the book:
1. The media must be more aware of the power of their words. Using language like “successful” sniper attacks, suicides, and bridge jumpers, and “failed” murder-suicides, for example, clearly suggest to viewers and readers that someone should keep trying again until they “succeed.”
2. The media must drop their clichéd stories about the “nice boy next door” or the “lone nut.” The copycat violent individual is neither mysterious nor healthy, or usually an overachiever. They are often a fatal combination of despondency, depression, and mental illness.
3. The media must cease its graphic and sensationalized wall-to-wall commentary and coverage of violent acts and the details of the actual methods and places where they occur. Tapes of people jumping off bridges, and live shots of things like car chases ending in deadly crashes, for example, merely glamorize these deaths, and create models for others.
4. The media should show more details about the grief of the survivors and victims (without glorifying the death), and highlight the alternatives to the violent acts
5. The media must avoid stereotypes in portraying the victims or the perpeators. Why set up situations that like-minded individuals (e.g. neo-Nazis) can use as a roadmap for a future rampages against similar victims?
6. The media should never publish a report on suicide or murder-suicide without adding the protective factors, such as the contact information for hot lines, help lines.
7. The media should reflect more on their role in creating our increasingly perceived violent society. Most of our lives are mundane, safe, and uneventful.

14 posted on 08/30/2015 8:19:10 AM PDT by Oatka (This is America. Assimilate or evaporate. [URL=http://media.photobucket.com/user/currencyjunkie/me)
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To: Godebert

I suspect the manifesto can not be revealed because its’ contents would clearly show the murders were a hate crime. And, since this was a black on white crime, it cannot see daylight for violating the approved agenda that all hate crimes are committed by whites against blacks and/or gays.


15 posted on 08/30/2015 10:12:33 AM PDT by Boomer One ( ToUse)
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To: Boomer One

Exactly.


16 posted on 08/30/2015 1:07:10 PM PDT by Godebert
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To: marktwain

A most disturbing issue as one watched an interview with family member Andy Parker was the lightning speed with which the interview popped up on TV bypassing the mourning, sincerity and humility stage that comes with grieving for a recently murdered family member.
Mr. Parker instead calls for gun control delivering his shocking political call to action to America within seconds:

We’ve got to do something about crazy people getting guns.

Who out there trusts this central socialist government after the deliberate orchestration of ‘Fast and Furious’?

Is there something to be discovered here in this ‘shooting incident’ that doesn’t seem quite right?

Again the shooter commits suicide and is moved offstage perhaps to pop up somewhere else living another life. If so, then America is a stage on which to present plays written and directed by the liberal pansies we’ve elected to rule our lives.


17 posted on 08/31/2015 4:46:54 AM PDT by HomerBohn (Liberals and slinkies: they're good for nothing, but you smile as you shove them down the stairs.)
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To: HomerBohn

We already do something about crazy people getting guns.

Man wasn’t crazy, he was evil.

Evil will always kill.


18 posted on 08/31/2015 4:48:16 AM PDT by Chickensoup (We lose our freedoms one surrender at a time)
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