"Grossman makes the case that our entire popular culture, our movies and television, the bulk of our narrative entertainment, is exactly like the military’s mind-altering indoctrination. In other words, if we, as a culture, decided that we wanted to turn everybody into a violent maniac, and overcome people’s resistance to killing, we would do exactly what we’re doing now. Make violence fun. Inure people to gore. Basically, Grossman says, our entertainment is like the opposite of what the protagonist of 'A Clockwork Orange' went through: It’s virtually designed to make viewers violent."

The author goes on to prescribe not censorship but a change in the movie rating system.

http://blog.sfgate.com/mlasalle/2012...nd-the-movies/

I'd imagine there have been homicidal psychos since the dawn of time, but as an aside It is interesting to note that we as a society are still in the guinea pig phase of exposure to mass media. Really, who knows what kind of effect this constant exposure is having on us as a society?

And I also fail to realize how this discussion differs in principle to the discussions in the locked thread but whatever.

The proximate cause may been been the film, some video game, the media etc but the ultimate cause appears to be mental illness. Had he lived in a different culture or time his pathology would not have manifested as The Joker with guns but perhaps some totemic god or avenging warrior. It would be as silly to blame the latter as it is to blame video games. Those culturally specific proximate causes are basically irrelevant.

I think it's an interesting question.

Sorry you think I'm baiting you, I'm disagreeing with you. If it didn't cause the shooting I think it's pointless to bring it up in the context of the shooting. Mostly because it becomes dueling links and he said he said. I don't find the conversation very interesting because the conclusion always seems to be censoring media producers, what else could it be? So it seems you want your cake and to eat it too.

That's speculation. We can't know for sure if or how often ancient humans slaughtered innocents like this (racial genocide is a different category) because we don't have the records. Obviously mental illness has been around since humans but we don't know if it has manifested itself like this before we were exposed to violent media.

@clovis' latest response fwiw

Cause and effect, or the lack thereof, seems so hard to pin down. If he had lived in a different culture or time, would his illness had even arisen? If so, what if he had been born and raised in, say, Switzerland or Singapore?

where do you work? this guy sounds like a psycho.

He's a ferry boat captain.

You keep posting questions about movies and shows I haven't seen. I can't help you.

Specifically TDK features a supervillain who appears impervious to pain or injury. He constantly breaks into secure buildings and takes people hostage at gun or knife-point and waxes poetically while he holds a knife to their mouths and tells another story about how he got scars on his face typically making them cry with fear right before he easily escapes unharmed again. The whole theme of the movie is the Joker playing a game of one-upmanship with himself trying to top his previous horrific acts--and he's super cool and philosophical every time. The theater I was in seemed pretty damn impressed when he blew up a hospital, for instance. He's constantly depicted as outsmarting the police and Batman including somehow dropping a noosed dead batman-impersonator out of a city building to scare someone looking out of a window and blowing up a police precinct to facilitate yet another escape. Oh, and whenever he's beaten it's because he really desired to be killed because he's so mysterious and deep. So deep as to bait people in to trying to assault him by saying some crap like, "I like to kill with knives because you get such a sense of closeness and can really tell a lot about a person. Would you like to know which of your friends I've killed were cowards?"

But then I've only seen the movie once and not recently, so maybe I'm forgetting some stuff.
Oh wait, I've thought of more:


The Joker relishes his victims and crimes and the camera admiringly lingers over his work. I think Claire used the term "fetishizes" which is apt, although in general I'd prefer to keep sex out of this.

The type of thinking that perpetuates the stigma on mental illness.

These *******s always seem to pop up

http://www.inquisitr.com/281726/west...oting-victims/

Proximate v ultimate cause has been established. The only intetesting point for this thread is the nature of his mental illness. Any discussion of violent media is just verbal masturbation.

Sometimes, even twice in the same thread.

Ok sure, now show how that makes somebody shoot 70 innocent people in a movie theater. I saw the dark knight, and I have yet to shoot up a theater.

Yeah I can see how it would be a boring or frustrating conversation. I'm not a censorship fan, but is it really that prudish of me to expect a modicum of self-censorship? Maybe just don't make movies that are obvious panders to sadists and sickoes? I encourage this by never watching Saw or Hostel or Dexter or Sopranos or whatever. Obviously I don't put Justified in the same category, and I rather presumed Batman II would be OK based on the prior movie.

Seeing as you cant prove a negative im curious how this is a fact?

Correlational studies cant prove causation and i doubt anyone is going to do a controlled experiment on whether violent imagery causes increased violence in individuals.

Im with Clare that people are looking at this issue in too "black and white" terms. The media shapes people but people also shape the media. Violent killers are inspired by, and themselves inspire, violent movies, television, etc.

But even if violent media leads to more crime, i think its a price we need to pay because the benefits of an uncensored society far outweigh the costs.

Stay away from the dark light!

The question I was responding to was, "How did TDK glorify violence?"

That I know.

Your question; I don't know. But a movie can be only a proximate cause and still make things worse.

Sopranos obviously panders to sickos and sadists...

I'm really unsure if you are being serious or not. Your avatar is a guy getting his arm chopped off.

there are tens of thousands of other media out there that "glorify violence" but apparently THIS ONE caused a mass shooting

On the subject of whether violent media could have caused this: can anybody find a decent source of an instance where 1000 years ago some psycho went and killed a bunch if innocents with his battle axe or whatever (not talking genocide or war, thats different). I couldn't.

Obviously they couldn't keep records then like we keep records now, but as far as I can tell there is no precedent for this sort if thing happening before the advent of mass media distribution.

I'm not trying to argue one way or the other, just making observations.

You obviously never heard of Vlad the Impaler

This is not 1000 years ago, but this girl tortured and killed little girls for fun back in the days.

One of many examples.

Well, a lot of that genocide and war was influenced by violent literature...

Well I've never seen it, but from the outside that's my impression, yes. It's about mafia guys killing people robbing and puffing themselves up about being honorable, right?

Maybe it doesn't belong in the 'panders to sickos and sadists' group. How about the 'flattering to criminals' dreck pile?

Well at least it's the bad guy.