I think he chooses his words carefully enough. He basically says that a govt law is wrong, but media should take it upon themselves to not report or something along those lines. I don't think he does enough to contradict himself. Nevertheless the whole thing was a pretty weak attempt at satire and I wish I could get my 4 min back.

Bolded is hilarious and I guess at this point completely expected.

BTW, how can you actually be friends with deplorables?

To his credit, Anderson Cooper has been refusing to name killers for a while now.

https://www.adweek.com/tvnewser/ande...-killer/296027

I'm not convinced that attention-seeking is a huge factor in these shootings. Being a victim of bullying seems to be more of a motivating factor. We're not seeing popular students committing these crimes even though they may love attention. More often it seems the shooter feels hopeless and lashes out at his oppressors.

As for mentioning their names, its part of the story, and its relevant. Knowing who they are and something about their personalities can give us insight into their motivations. To expect the media to conspire to suppress relevant information for reasons that are kind of fuzzy seems to be an overreaction. Its like the video game argument. Maybe it has some merit, but do we all agree its time to ban violent video games?

I'm not so sure how much I buy the whole attention-seeking thing. Normally when people seek attention, they post Photoshopped selfies on Instagram that show off their "good side" or type vague status updates on Facebook.

the pro gun arguments itt are absolutely pathetic

Not sure how "normal" attention seeking activities applies to school shooters.

I have a big problem with media outlets doing 24/7 coverage of the shooter's background and acting as criminal psychologist while essentially giving the shooter a platform.

Headlines like the following are counterproductive

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-44194074

FYP. Apparently minorities, women and LGBT kids never get bullied.

I do agree that national notoriety may not be as much of a factor as local (IE - getting back at kids within that school). But I'm still in favor of almost never mentioning the shooter's name or showing their picture.

but do WE really need to know their personalities or motivations? How does that help? And even if we do, its possible to say "The shooter was a person who some describe as isolated and alone, and had made threats both verbally and written in the days leading up to the attack." This does not tell us the shooter's name or show his picture, and provides the relevant info.

It is possible to cover this newsworthy event as news without sensationalism. We aren't doing that now.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umpqua...llege_shooting

Report the incident. Stop the faces and names. "The shooter" works fine.

I'm all for tighter control of media reporting on these incidents but in the internet age I'm not sure how much good it would do. Name and face would still be instantly all over Reddit etc. Worth a try though.

There are a couple of situations where names are commonly withheld. One is in the case of rape victims. Rarely are their names released. I believe this is to protect them from embarrassment or humiliation. Now it could be argued that women should not be ashamed in rape cases, but that view apparently hasn't taken hold enough to change the tradition of not identifying rape victims.

The other is in the case of juveniles charged with lesser crimes. The logic for that again is to save them from the embarrassment of publicity, because, since they are young, they are redeemable. Your logic for not identifying mass killers is for an entirely different reason, though one could make an argument that withholding the name does spare them and their families from humiliation as well.

When discussing this, one could also ask if serial killers get the same consideration. There have been several occasions where the defendants appear to love the notoriety. I dunno. Its a worthy topic. We'll see how its addressed over time. My general view is that the media is in the business of reporting information, not withholding it. And I guess I get concerned when people advocate a reduction of information released to the public.

Trump lies to the public pretty much every day he isn't playing golf and the MSM just normalizes it. FOX lies to the public almost as much as Trump does and nothing happens to them. Why not dream of a future where news organizations are held to a standard of proof and correctness instead of just wishing we could make rules abridging free speech to keep the name of murderers out of the news.

I dont think a law should be passed. It would obviously be voluntary on the part of the news outlets.

I am fine with releasing the name once but I am not ok with the constant attention devoted to psychoanalyzing the shooter and reporting on his background. Same feeling towards serial killers.

Regulating the media content like that would be horrible. You don't keep giving government more power and then be shocked when some ******* abuses it. Remember, when you pass the Truth in Media or No Names for Killers law that some Trump appointee is going to be administering it and twisting it whatever way they can.

No need for law. Shame could do it.

DON'T FEED THIS

That's cool imo.

It's plausible that there's a link between media reporting and motivation for crime.

On the other hand, those other first world nations that have solved the school shooting problem did it through gun control first.

So how about trying the thing that definitely works and then, if there's still a problem, you can try the thing that maybe might have a bit of an impact.

If credible sources don't fill the void then those looking to deliberately spread misinformation will have a field day. Every single one of these shooters might end up being a Muslim in the minds of millions of Americans if the perpetrators are not identified because that's what the derposphere will be telling them.

Lol @ the good-guy-with-gun slam dunk attempt. Here's a mind-blowing thought: if the bad guys didn't have guns, we wouldn't need random good guys w/ guns to shoot them in the back after some good guys without guns were already murdered!

But imo the solution to school shootings is to have all students prepare by playing Active Shooter as the civilian role. It's available June 6th, from the maker of "White Power: Pure Voltage" My only gripe is that it doesn't have an armed teacher mode.

Wow, this adios guy is just a despicable human being.

And the next thing in line to be blamed for school shootings is... *spins big wheel of right-wing scapegoats*... porn? Might need to respin here, they can't blame THAT for it. Can they?

I stand corrected.

There's porn at the grocery store? Man, I've been missing out all this time.

Yeah, the less-obvious LOL there is the terminal case of the olds you have to have to imagine that paper magazines at the grocery store is the way that a single modern teenager ever accesses pornography. There's this thing called the internet.

Dominic has blood on his hands.

The subtext here is that this Congresscritter has had some peon doing her grocery shopping for her for like the past 20 years.