Senator Mike Lee has introduced a resolution in the Senate asking the media to stop naming mass shooters voluntarily.
Most mass shooters have one thing in common. They want to be infamous and have their names and faces plastered all over TV and in the papers. It is the contagion effect. Through multiple interviews with mass shooters and through studying the manifestos of these killers, we have learned the vast majority of them carried out their heinous crimes to become famous.
This trend started after the Columbine tragedy when two mentally disturbed students shot up a school in Colorado. The media ran wall-to-wall coverage with the killers’ names and faces plastered across television screens and newspapers. Other violent, mentally ill individuals saw the level of fame these two monsters received and wanted to replicate their actions to obtain the same notoriety.
The latest shooter is no different. He studied other shooters and wanted their fame. In fact, there is an average of .3 mass shooting in the 13 days after an attack happens. This number might not seem like much, but the chance of another mass shooting occurring in the next two weeks because of the coverage of this killer is at 30%. By simply not naming the shooter, the media can make a massive difference. The press can still cover the events without saying their name or showing their face.
In 2019, several journalists, including this journalist, pledged to stop naming the killers. This movement was started by groups such as “No Notoriety.” No Notoriety is an organization of data scientists that look at the breakdown of mass shooters and their motives. They discovered that most mass shooters are seeking fame, although many have other motives as well. They reason that if we can eliminate the social contagion aspect, we can save lives.
“Don’t Name Them” is another organization that has researched the social contagion aspect of mass shooters. The organization is based at Texas State University and has committed a lot of time and effort to study the impact of media organizations sharing the names and pictures of mass shooters. Their conclusion is that of every other peer-reviewed study. One of the main driving factors in mass shootings is the mentally deranged individual seeking fame.
Even the FBI has asked the media to stop sharing the names and photos of these killers, but the press has disregarded these requests. The public wants to know who carried out these pure evil acts of violence, and that is understandable. But we must ask ourselves, “Will knowing the name and face of a psychopath change anything?” Knowing motives and characteristics is one thing, but the names were not known before the shooting. If one of the fundamental motivations of the killer is to be known, we should deny them their goal.
Senator Lee’s resolution is symbolic, as it has no force of law and shouldn’t. To do so would violate the First Amendment. It makes the media look at itself and ask if the ratings are worth the blood on their hands. The research is clear. The contagion effect is real. If we want to cut down on these tragedies, let’s take away what these killers want most: fame.
Whether most media organizations will agree to stop naming these killers remains to be seen, but hopes are not high. In the media, there is a saying, “If it bleeds, it leads.” To change the culture of the media is a monumental task. It starts with all of us. The all-mighty dollar influences the media more than any political lean. In the end, we click the links and watch wall-to-wall coverage of shootings, typing away, trying to find names and pictures of the killers. Maybe we should learn the names of the victims instead.
About John Crump
Mr. Crump is an NRA instructor and a constitutional activist. John has written about firearms, interviewed people from all walks of life, and on the Constitution. John lives in Northern Virginia with his wife and sons, follow him on X at @crumpyss, or at www.crumpy.com.
Lee’s heart is in the right place, but it’s not the shooters’ names and pictures appearing on the news that’s really the problem. The notoriety they crave isn’t just simple name recognition. Above all, they want to be feared. Whether they’ve actually experienced real bullying or not, they feel belittled by everyone around them, and they have a powerful urge to prove themselves. If they can’t be respected as men, they’d prefer to be feared as monsters. The news coverage surrounding these shootings has convinced them the best way to effect that is to pick up what the media insists… Read more »
Sounds like a step toward turning news into an unverifiable myth.
The only thing that stops the Mainstream media from passing every shooter off as a Right Wing Conspiracy theorist gun nut is that we can find out who they are and what they actually believe.
Right now, we can determine the details about a shooter based on if the media releases the name. If they hold it, then the shooter doesn’t fit their narrative.
I have mixed feelings about this. Withholding names will only increase possibly justified suspicions regarding the shooter, their backgrounds, and motives, for a rampage. You can tell a lot by names sometimes just by the name. Ethnicity, religion, culture, and other factors may be apparent. As others have noted, names allow for research of social media, court records, media articles, and other potential resources. I am not sure that withholding names is the best idea.
do you honestly think any of the legacy media outlets will NOT put the murderers picture and name out there as much as they can. it is ratings, come on man! the legacy has really never had a moral compass or on the chance they did it was broken years ago when they became politicized.
Gee, you don’t want to tell us what they used and it is always an assault gun that is a weapon of war even when it’s not, you don’t want to give us drug reports because you don’t want us to know that they were on isotropic drugs, you don’t want to tell us their sexual affiliation because it was a lesbo or a fag and you don’t want to tell us their political affiliation because you know it was a fellow democrap. Now, you want to hold back on the name too so we have no way of running… Read more »
Col. Dave Grossman suggested this 20+ years ago, and it can only help. As usual, if it’s good for the “deplorable” or fly-over country, the MSM want nothing to do with it.
Arguments can be made for both positions but I couldn’t say which is more right than the other. It probably wouldn’t be so much of a problem if they all ended-up as losers who were killed at the scene by armed citizens before they could do much harm, though…
I agree with the sentiment that active shooters want to go out in a blaze of glory, but as we’ve seen with the attempted assassination of Donald Trump, sometimes the government wants to cover-up the facts & destroy evidence. In instances such as this, it is imperative for citizen journalists to be able to obtain the identity of the perpetrator as soon as humanly possible. Otherwise, the public ends up with more questions than answers.
Part of upholding the 1st Amendment is identifying the perp, particularly when the perp is killed by return gunfire.
Lee can go to hell. I’m sick of Politicians from any side of the Swamp seeking to censor news.