Posted on 12/15/2007 7:46:34 AM PST by rellimpank
The way the media cover an event influences whether there will be repetitions. For example, if a fan runs onto the field during a baseball game, the broadcast cameras usually avoid showing pictures of the fan. The TV producers know that the fan on the field is seeking attention, and that, presumably, getting his picture on television will reward him. Moreover, broadcasting the man's antics would encourage copycats.
Killing time at a baseball game is a tiny misdeed, compared to killing people, but many media decisions have the effect of encouraging copycat murders.
Last April, The Denver Post published on its front page five "glamour shots" that the Virginia Tech murderer had taken of himself, and sent to NBC. On Wednesday, the Post ran a front-page picture of the young man who killed two at a youth missionary center in Arvada and two others at a church in Colorado Springs, along with very large-type excerpts from the killer's rantings. In the first sentence, the killer compared himself to the Virginia Tech killer.
(Excerpt) Read more at rockymountainnews.com ...
Uh, wrong end of the baboon......
If you do what you say you are considering below, and you practice as you must, then you will. Hardly anyone doesn't like guns after they shoot awhile. Except maybe Frou Frou. But she's coming around too. I know she'll make it. :)
However, I an considering a concealed carry permit and buying a pistol so that, should I have the misfortune to come accross such a scene, I could end it like the lady in Colorado.
That's not an ugly baboon, this is an ugly baboon, and a horn dog.
I posted on this very point over at NewsBusters. The first such shooting in a “gun-free zone” could possibly have been a “gimme”. But, once the owners of such gun-free zones saw what can happen, they should have taken those signs down. I hope that the survivors of such shootings start filing law suits, perhaps even class-action suits against shopping malls, banks, universities, schools, and such places that have taken away the right of self-defense from the people. If they post such a sign, they have assumed the duty to defend the people inside. If they are negligent in that duty, then they should be sued into bankruptcy. All those signs do is proclaim “Victims Here!”
I left out a step? Ummmm....practice some more?
If the prohibition was on publishing, they it would violate the first amendment. But in spite of what the press might say, there is no right to "know" such information, so if the police and others don't reveal it, it will be less likely to be blared out of every media orifice. The same is true of the tapes of the scum "in action", audio tapes of the event and so forth. Probably it will still get out, eventually. But by that time it won't be worth the wall to wall coverage that these things tend to get now.
In one of the Second Foundation books, the emperor decries exactly this. The names and faces of troublemakers are forever stricken from the public record. They are assigned a number.
It’s fiction of course, but the premise is accurate. Copycats were sowing chaos to get famous. They simply disappeared forever. It’s a great idea.
Training. I'd take a 2-3 day beginners gun handling fundamentals class first.
Then a lot of practice.
I've seen guys who've been shooting for years, just practicing bad habits. They've burned up thousands of rounds of ammo, are unsafe, and still lousy shots.
One excellent instructor and IPSC marksman who conducts terrific classes is Bruce Gray.
http://www.grayguns.com/docs/about.htm
I doubt your good intentions will work. I don’t know of anyone who disliked guns who put in the practice and money to become proficient enough to handle themselves with firearms.
There was one person in particular that had no success in hitting a target no matter how much time was spent. It was only later, the person started playing with a supressed .22 pistol that the person started really enjoying shooting. The person’s results improved from that moment.
I just thought that bore repeating.
“It used to be that the local radio and TV stations were owned by the mom-and-pop organizations; these private family-owned media companies usually were from the community. So they had a vested interest in the community, their kids went to the schools, they went to the churches, they were very concerned about the community. That’s not the case any more.
Most of these stations are owned by huge conglomerates, these media companies such as Infinity or Clear Channel. Basically, they own everything. They’re not looking at it as an individual community, they’re looking at it as part of their bigger picture, what the bottom line is.
There’s a lot of pressure on local managerswhether it be the news director or general manager of a TV station, or the program director of a radio stationto really meet those bottom-line requests. Often, what they’re forced to do is to do much more with much less. And that’s why you see so much of the lowest common denominator, so much crime, so much quick and easy coverage.
Crime is extremely cheap and extremely easy to cover, especially in a big city like Detroit or in New York or in Chicago, where all you have to do is look out your window and you can find a fire or a murder or a shooting, and it doesn’t take a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter to cover any of that stuff. They simply show up with a camera, put the mast up on the live truck, they shoot the video, they shoot the cop cars, they talk to the victims, they get the screaming parents and stick the microphone in their facesit’s not that difficult to cover, and there’s a plethora of that stuff out there.
And you can milk it all day long. You can do teases, you can do live shots, you can do tape stories. They’re doing as much as they can with the little they have, because there’s so much pressure now on TV and radio stations to meet that bottom line.
There was a survey that came out about two years ago that was done by a national consulting firm, that showed that local TV stations, in terms of news, were hemorrhaging viewers. They are just losing viewers left and right. Most of the people just don’t find anything that means anything to them on local news, because they’re not really covering the community.
Yes, there should be a certain amount of crime coverage, when stories are very serious, and you want to know what’s going on in your community, but you don’t need to cover every car accident and every fire and every shooting. People get tired of that because it doesn’t pertain to them.
So they want to see more coverage on school issues, on tax issues, on faith issues, on medical issues, but they’re not getting it from the local news. So they’ll go to a network news source, or they’ll go to the Internet, or they’ll read the paper. But local news [on TV] has just died in the last few years in terms of losing viewers and ratings.
Teresa Tomeo: ‘Turn off your TV and tell the media why’ (interview excerpt) — published on MoralityInMedia.org website long ago...
That doesn't follow.
The mall is private property, and they have every right to make it a gun-free zone. I'm sure that if FReepers own stores, they wouldn't want the government coming in and telling them they had to paint their shelves pink, or play the Adhan, or allow foul language, etc.
Similarly, potential customers have every right to avoid the mall, and if they choose to enter, the Gun-Free Zone signs clearly let them know they are entering a place that isn't safe.
Property owners also have every right to polish their floors to a glossy shine and coat them with silicone lubricant. But I guarantee if they do, and a customer slips and cracks his head open, they’re going to be sued for all they’re worth. As they should be.
(And incidentally, there’s a hell of a difference between painting the shelves pink and creating an environment that attracts people like Matthew Murray.)
...and the same if they don’t polish the floors thus?
If they don’t take an action that creates a dangerous environment for their customers, then they have no liability.
It is now known, and can be convincingly argued and demonstrated, that posting “no guns” signs creates a dangerous environment.
Yes, they do have the right to make it a gun free zone if they wish. But, when they do make it a gun free zone, knowing that criminals will not obey their little sign, they also take upon themselves the responsibility to protect their customers from such predators. If they fail in their assumed obligation, then they are liable for the results.
Every right has an accompanying responsibility.
I came of age in the late 60s and early 70s. At that time, it was all peace, love,___, drugs and rock ‘n roll.
When the air [and your head] clears, you realize that such an ambitious utopia is not a reality.
Unless you are Hillary Clinton.
If it's so known and clear, then anyone going into the mall has been given warning of the conditions.
Nice point, but I think a jury will disagree.
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