The coverage of these tragedies and social life on the Internet have fueled the problems that United States’ Second Amendment law allows in the country.
Before Golden State Warriors coach Steve Kerr played an important playoff game against the Dallas Mavericks, he never thought about the game. “There are no basketball questions of importance today, we’ve been through a lot of tragedies in recent weeks. When are we going to do something? I’m tired of coming here to pay my respects, I’m tired of the silences. Enough, we can’t here keep reading and shut up.” The technician’s reflection stunned the journalists present, and that is that the murder of 21 people, including 19 children, by an 18-year-old boy who entered a Texas school armed, is the straw that breaks the camel’s back. through social networks.
Columbine, Virginia Tech, Orlando, San Bernardino, Las Vegas, Sandy Hook, Parkland and now Uvalde. These are just some of the places where mass shootings have taken place in the United States over the past 20 years, violent crimes that have increased over the past decade, reaching a staggering 212 cases this year. Due to the proliferation of these acts, there are studies trying to pinpoint the specific underlying cause. Investigators James Meindl and Jonathan Ivy say these crimes are “contagious” and linked to much traditional news or social media reaction. “Widespread imitation serves as a model to explain how one person’s behavior can influence another person to adopt similar behaviors.”
Jennifer Murray, a professor of Justice and Social Research at the University of Arizona, argues that coverage of these murders ultimately contributes to the shooter’s popularity. The teacher shows that shootings like those at Virginia Tech and Sandy Hook were inspired by the famous 1999 Columbine Massacre. The authors of these cases showed signs of infatuation with the Colorado attack through self-recordings, photographs, and notes. Researchers also found that shooters are drawn to the media’s ability to easily facilitate exposure. The combination of the narcissistic tendencies of these gunmen and the increased media coverage has led to an increase in these crimes.
It is not news that they are already part of the everyday world society, and it is that in Spain, for example, about 70% of the population was part of a social network in 2010; ten years later, that percentage has risen to 86%. This phenomenon is globally equivalent and has changed the way the media works on these issues. Kristina Lee, a lawyer at Elon University, explains in a report that as social media use increases, so does the coverage of mass shootings. Lee believes this also further reflects the gunmen’s desire for fame and their propensity to copy a crime.
The increase in mass shootings since 2011 and the rise of online social life show that social networks most likely have some effect on these crimes. On May 14, 18-year-old Payton Gendron murdered 10 people in a supermarket in Buffalo, New York. The victims’ relatives horrified the social network Facebook for distributing images that made some of them aware of the news; and to the Twitch platform, which specializes in live content, which allowed the author to broadcast the carnage live. Last week, New York Attorney General Letitia James announced that her office was investigating social media companies following the tragedy. An article on the case from Forbes magazine explains that the shooter brought his community with him via a live broadcast. These were primed and ready to send the horrific images of innocent people being slaughtered before the social networking site, Twitch, could take them down.
Uvalde’s tragedy has shattered the established paradigm around gun ownership and has thrust its defenders into the spotlight of American society. But the conversation about the negative influence of social media in these disasters remains under the radar.
Source: La Verdad
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