The question is a little misleading. And I really don't want to mix it up with well funded lobby groups like the NRA. My actual question is this what role does the media play-and continue to play in the aftermath of shootings involving multiple victims in the US.
There is a great comment attributed to Morgan Freeman, the gist of which is this. If you put the killer up on a pedestal even give him (to my knowledge female's don't commit that many mass murders) a catchy nickname, you glamourise and even memorialise their crime.
An example, everyone remembers the 'trenchcoat mafia' but try and name one single victim of Columbine, without resorting to Wikipedia. Can you?
24hr news channels have to have news, so when something awful like Sandy Hook or Gabriel Giffords or Century Sixteen happens they flock to the spot and drill down into the life of the the looney that committed the crime, they interview his mother, his babysitter, people who went to school with him (that's him again with the single white guys) and lay out a buffet of his life on the next bulletin and we lap it up, ratings go up, much hand wringing, talking heads, psycho babble and on to the next big bad thing.
We get the media we deserve so someone must be watching this crap but how different would things be if the shooter wasn't named, no details. That is what a lot of European countries do, Mr A, or Mr S, that's all they get they are not glorified. An investigation is carried out and the findings used to make sure that 'this never happens again'
But in the US it happens again and again. Ask yourself, why is that?
I haven't put any references with this article but I will research the male to female ratio in regard to major incidents involving firearms and add it to this post.
