03 October 2015
NEWS FEATURE To name or not to name: media wrestle with naming mass shooter By Peter Voskamp, dpa
Washington (dpa) - In the wake of another mass shooting in the United States, US media confronted the dilemma over how much to focus on the gunman.
In the age of 24-7 media saturation, the question has become: when does reporting the facts inadvertantly play into the killer's desire for widespread notoriety - and in the process plant the seed for the next disturbed person with a gun?
After Thursday's shooting in Roseburg, Oregon, in which a 26-year-old man killed nine students at a community college before being shot dead by police, Douglas County Sheriff John Hanlin urged the media not to name the killer.
"I continue to believe that those media and community members who publicize his name will only glorify his horrific actions ... and eventually this will only serve to inspire future shooters," Hanlin said.
The sheriff's remarks led to a social media debate among two major television news anchors.
Responding to Hanlin's call, CNN's Don Lemon said on the air Thursday, "unfortunately we ... must identify him because that is our job."
Fox News host Megan Kelly, however, supported Hanlin via Twitter: "Good for him!" she wrote.
Kelly went on to disagree with Lemon, saying, "No. Print media can. TV gives infamy he prob desired. Don't!"
Lemon in turn wrote: "My heart agrees with you, but I believe [journalists] must name shooters. Sparingly though."
Others in the field agreed with Lemon.
Kelly McBride of the Poynter Institute, a journalism school, wrote Friday that to avoid naming shooters was "a bad idea."
She argued that making the name public allows for those who may have known the shooter to come forward with important information. It is also essential to help identify trends and guard against misinformation.
"It's easy and convenient for politicians to beat the press up by accusing them of glorifying a bad person. Responsible reporting is the antidote," McBride wrote.
However there is increasing evidence that media saturation could lead to copycats.
The shooter's own social media postings suggest he tracked other mass shootings. In one post, he appeared to urge readers to watch the online footage of Vester Flanagan shooting two former colleagues live on TV in August in Virginia, writing, "A man who was known by no one, is now known by everyone ... seems the more people you kill, the more you're in the limelight."
A 2015 study by Arizona State University and Northeastern Illinois University, entitled, "Contagion in Mass Killings and School Shootings" found "20 to 30 per cent of attacks are set off by other attacks."
In 2014 after six people were killed in Isla Vista, California, US blogger Ezra Klein wrote: "Mass murderers want glory and fame. Somehow we have to stop giving it to them."
He noted that news organizations stopped reporting suicides in large part because they had been found to be "contagious," and wondered if a similar approach might be appropriate with mass killers.
Klein cited sociologist Zeynep Tufekci who wrote in 2013 that he was "increasingly concerned that the tornado of media coverage that swirls around each such mass killing ... as well as the detailed and sensationalist reporting ... may be creating a vicious cycle of copycat effects similar to those found in teen and other suicides."
No Notoriety is an organization that calls upon the media to limit reporting on the perpetrator "for the sake of public safety."
"Recognize that the prospect of infamy could serve as a motivating factor for other individuals to kill others and could inspire copycat crimes," No Notoriety says on its website. "Keep this responsibility in mind when reporting."
And after Roseburg, it appears televised media may be taking it to heart. On Friday, during a segment with Republican presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee, a CNN anchor said the network would not name The Roseburg killer. It used the words "gunman," "shooter," "this man" or "this person" to describe him.
The digital versions of the New York Times and Washington Post however both displayed a photo of the Roseburg killer at the top of their homepages, along with his name.
In the age of 24-7 media saturation, the question has become: when does reporting the facts inadvertantly play into the killer's desire for widespread notoriety - and in the process plant the seed for the next disturbed person with a gun?
After Thursday's shooting in Roseburg, Oregon, in which a 26-year-old man killed nine students at a community college before being shot dead by police, Douglas County Sheriff John Hanlin urged the media not to name the killer.
"I continue to believe that those media and community members who publicize his name will only glorify his horrific actions ... and eventually this will only serve to inspire future shooters," Hanlin said.
The sheriff's remarks led to a social media debate among two major television news anchors.
Responding to Hanlin's call, CNN's Don Lemon said on the air Thursday, "unfortunately we ... must identify him because that is our job."
Fox News host Megan Kelly, however, supported Hanlin via Twitter: "Good for him!" she wrote.
Kelly went on to disagree with Lemon, saying, "No. Print media can. TV gives infamy he prob desired. Don't!"
Lemon in turn wrote: "My heart agrees with you, but I believe [journalists] must name shooters. Sparingly though."
Others in the field agreed with Lemon.
Kelly McBride of the Poynter Institute, a journalism school, wrote Friday that to avoid naming shooters was "a bad idea."
She argued that making the name public allows for those who may have known the shooter to come forward with important information. It is also essential to help identify trends and guard against misinformation.
"It's easy and convenient for politicians to beat the press up by accusing them of glorifying a bad person. Responsible reporting is the antidote," McBride wrote.
However there is increasing evidence that media saturation could lead to copycats.
The shooter's own social media postings suggest he tracked other mass shootings. In one post, he appeared to urge readers to watch the online footage of Vester Flanagan shooting two former colleagues live on TV in August in Virginia, writing, "A man who was known by no one, is now known by everyone ... seems the more people you kill, the more you're in the limelight."
A 2015 study by Arizona State University and Northeastern Illinois University, entitled, "Contagion in Mass Killings and School Shootings" found "20 to 30 per cent of attacks are set off by other attacks."
In 2014 after six people were killed in Isla Vista, California, US blogger Ezra Klein wrote: "Mass murderers want glory and fame. Somehow we have to stop giving it to them."
He noted that news organizations stopped reporting suicides in large part because they had been found to be "contagious," and wondered if a similar approach might be appropriate with mass killers.
Klein cited sociologist Zeynep Tufekci who wrote in 2013 that he was "increasingly concerned that the tornado of media coverage that swirls around each such mass killing ... as well as the detailed and sensationalist reporting ... may be creating a vicious cycle of copycat effects similar to those found in teen and other suicides."
No Notoriety is an organization that calls upon the media to limit reporting on the perpetrator "for the sake of public safety."
"Recognize that the prospect of infamy could serve as a motivating factor for other individuals to kill others and could inspire copycat crimes," No Notoriety says on its website. "Keep this responsibility in mind when reporting."
And after Roseburg, it appears televised media may be taking it to heart. On Friday, during a segment with Republican presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee, a CNN anchor said the network would not name The Roseburg killer. It used the words "gunman," "shooter," "this man" or "this person" to describe him.
The digital versions of the New York Times and Washington Post however both displayed a photo of the Roseburg killer at the top of their homepages, along with his name.