Mass Killers Crave Notoriety. Lets Take it Away

On the day of my only child’s graduation from high-school, my thoughts are around the root cause of mass violence. It’s not what you think.

The availability of weapons in the hands of crazy people is clearly a major factor, we can and must also take away the notoriety to take away the violence. This transcends the left/right politics around guns in America.

How? In the wake of the continuing American tragedy that is rooted in mass gun violence, we must Build a consensus around narrative, harnessing the power of technology and media to take the shooter out of the story. There is good evidence that this can be effective.

Elliot Ackerman, in an Atlantic article in early June, titled, Our narrative of mass shootings is killing us., suggests a path not rooted in the stalemate politics of left and right, gun violance and gun rights.

Quoting from Ackerman’s article: researchers conducted a study of contagion and mass killings and shootings and found a measurable increase in the likelihood of a second mass shooting for 13 days after an initial mass shooting.…they also determined in the study that individual school shootings on average created nearly 22% More shootings. So for every five school shootings a sixth would take place that would not otherwise have occurred. Since Buffalo, this can be seen playing out in real time.

Both social and traditional media drive this contagion. Jennifer Johnson of Western New Mexico University found that identification with prior mass shooters, made famous by extensive media coverage is a more powerful push towards violence than mental health status or even access to guns.

We must change the narrative, and with groups like Nonotoriety build a national media consensus that takes the perpetrator out of the role of protagonist and as effectively as possible erase them from media coverage.

This will not be easy, but I’m convinced that it can be done and be effective. This is a rare case, where consensus can be found between leaders from Fox News, to PBS, to Facebook, from Tucker Carlson to Judy Woodruff.