tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/virginia-shootings-19824/articlesVirginia shootings – The Conversation2015-08-28T09:32:20Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/467862015-08-28T09:32:20Z2015-08-28T09:32:20ZLessons for media educators from the Virginia on-air shootings<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/93233/original/image-20150827-378-1fv35wr.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Coverage of slain TV journalists from the station where they worked.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.wdbj7.com/news/local/a-look-at-the-lives-of-wdbj7s-alison-parker-and-adam-ward/34929588">WDBJ7</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>As a professor specializing in broadcast communication, I have tried to find lessons to teach aspiring journalists following the shooting of two TV journalists this week. </p>
<p>When I first heard about the shootings in Virginia of reporter Alison Parker and cameraman Adam Ward, I immediately thought back to a conversation I had with a former student just two days earlier. She is about the same age as Alison was and will shortly start a job at her second station since graduating. She’s doubling her salary and cannot wait for the new opportunity. </p>
<p>In the span of a few days, I have gone from feeling happy for her to now being more aware of her safety and the issues she will face. It has gotten me thinking about what I, as an educator, should be teaching my students and how, if at all, I can prepare them for what they may face when they enter the “real world” as a media professional. </p>
<p>The obvious lesson is being aware of your surroundings. Trust your instincts; if something doesn’t feel right, it probably isn’t. Don’t be afraid to voice your concerns.</p>
<h2>Speaking up</h2>
<p>On the day of the shooting, we had three news crews on campus wanting to talk to faculty and students about the shootings. I took the opportunity to talk to a reporter and a multimedia journalist about their thoughts and reactions to see if I could glean insight that I could share with my students. </p>
<p>The predominant theme, as you might imagine immediately after such an incident, was safety. The reporter talked about the need for greater understanding by management in the newsroom about the potential dangers reporters face in the field. </p>
<p>He noted that management is quick to send reporters out to cover stories and to do live shots in all types of locations with little thought for their safety. It is not that management is indifferent, but just that safety is less of a consideration than getting a good shot for the evening news. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/93232/original/image-20150827-368-1yj1s19.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/93232/original/image-20150827-368-1yj1s19.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/93232/original/image-20150827-368-1yj1s19.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/93232/original/image-20150827-368-1yj1s19.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/93232/original/image-20150827-368-1yj1s19.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/93232/original/image-20150827-368-1yj1s19.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/93232/original/image-20150827-368-1yj1s19.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/93232/original/image-20150827-368-1yj1s19.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">More precautions in the field?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/ume-y/5003494177/in/photolist-8C9duZ-9GTciW-bn4CJL-TcGpW-8XmFiD-71N4QK-3E2Zh-7B2ft1-7AXrqT-4J73yQ-8NUVZ9-7bn7oV-hPvPhm-ahw7Wp-6QAapg-7cvmdc-53WGAQ-7czdWy-wCaJo-3PK9m-fhJT1i-Nf8J4-wC1Uk-vtqmpJ-8wZ5Fu-8aZzd4-36rKis-oYC4H5-6n69gm-5b9J4c-7cvkJk-7cvmpV-7AY2tD-7bqVM3-7bn7zM-2PKznG-7bn7W8-bxaQkq-4AwbFR-FhFDD-2PcjTx-7bn7gg-7bqV3d-7cvm3k-bnRarX-5RVQhm-21GQmF-84P14E-91Spea-3eCxv2">ume-y/flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
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<p>Reporters have always known that you never quite know who’s going to show up when you go live. Go on YouTube and you can find lots of videos of people waving in the background during a reporter’s live shot. For the most part, it’s seen as an annoying part of the job, but as the incident in Virginia shows, it really can be fraught with danger. </p>
<p>Safety needs to be a major factor – something we as educators need to highlight. In our departmental newscast, we send students out on campus to do live shots via Skype. I’ll still send them out, but what I teach about doing a live shot will change.</p>
<h2>Dealing with pressure</h2>
<p>Typically in doing a live shot, a reporter will have a photographer and an engineer with him or her. But multimedia journalists are by definition on their own, which can increase the risk they face. </p>
<p>The multimedia journalist I spoke to mentioned an incident within the last couple of weeks in which he had to travel to another town to do a live report in an area that was unfamiliar to him. </p>
<p>He stated that he had a bad feeling about the area as soon as he arrived and quickly relayed his concerns to the station and informed them that he would be moving to another area where he felt safer. He didn’t give the station management the option, but instead took responsibility for his own safety. </p>
<p>The former student whom I referenced earlier will be working as a multimedia journalist. I hope she will have the courage to speak up if necessary, and that safety will be a concern when she is sent out on stories.</p>
<p>The irony about the shooting in Virginia is that the live shot did not appear to be in a dangerous area, and there was no way that Alison and Adam could have foreseen what was about to happen. It was just like any other unexpected act of violence, except it happened on live television and the media-savvy shooter took advantage of his knowledge of the station and social media to ensure that his heinous act would have the greatest impact.</p>
<p>As educators, we’re confronted continually with the issue of mental illness. The pressure to succeed and the pressure of grades and exams can exacerbate a diagnosed or undiagnosed problem. We have mechanisms in place to try and help students. </p>
<p>As we train future media professionals, we need to highlight even more the pressures that they will face in a newsroom and how they can cope with them. We’re not professional counselors, but we can talk through scenarios and increase awareness. Maybe we can help steer students to other careers in media where they can use their skills but do not involve the deadline-driven pressure that news necessitates? </p>
<h2>Life lessons</h2>
<p>In our classes, we’re often quick to tout the positives of social media, but this incident offers a sobering reminder that what is used for good can also be used for evil. This leads to the issue of ethics. </p>
<p>I learned of an educator who, on the day of the shooting, was showing the various videos of the shooting in his classroom to highlight the ethical issues that were at play and to spark a discussion. The decision about whether or not to show the video in class is in itself an ethical issue. In my opinion, you can still have this discussion in a meaningful way without replaying the deaths of the individuals.</p>
<p>Sadly, it often takes tragedy to spark change and to cause us to confront issues. Overall, what I think I will tell my students has as much to do with life as it does with professional practices. Be slow to anger, be patient in suffering and be quick to love. As Alison and Adam seemed to be doing, try and do what you love, and enjoy each day as the gift it is, because tomorrow is never guaranteed.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/46786/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andrew M Clark does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The shooting of two TV journalists prompts a broadcast communication professor to draw insights on ethics and personal safety and pass them on to aspiring journalists.Andrew M Clark, Associate Professor of Broadcast Communication, University of Texas at ArlingtonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/467342015-08-27T07:46:06Z2015-08-27T07:46:06ZWhat motivates public place murders?<p>Few details have come to light about what motivated Vester Lee Flanagan, the shooter of two Virginia television reporters, to commit his atrocious on-air crime. Reports suggest he was a disgruntled former employee of the TV station who nursed grievances about his perceived treatment by ex-colleagues. Racism, bullying, and harassment on the basis of his sexual identity, could have played a role.</p>
<p>At first glance, this fits neatly with research suggesting perpetrators of public acts of lethal violence fall into <a href="https://www.ncjrs.gov/App/publications/abstract.aspx?ID=136809">distinct typologies or categories</a>. These “types” include the “disgruntled employee”, who murders people with whom they had a workplace association, the “<a href="http://www.jaapl.org/content/38/1/87.full">pseudo-commando</a>”, who goes on a militaristic “killing mission”, and “set-and-run” killers, who use methods such as bombs and leave the crime scene before the murders occur. </p>
<p>Classifying killers into particular types is intuitively appealing. It helps us make sense of what otherwise seems senseless. However, this approach tells us only the smallest fraction about what motivates public place murderers. It says little about what factors may lead to public acts of lethal violence. </p>
<p>Murder has many motivations – money, interpersonal conflict, and even love. But killers who deliberately commit their acts in public places are <a href="http://ijo.sagepub.com/content/early/2014/01/20/0306624X13519963">often motivated by revenge</a>. This may be against individuals, certain groups of people (based on race or gender, for example), <a href="http://www.boston.com/community/blogs/crime_punishment/2011/01/the_real_causes_of_mass_murder.html">or the world in general</a>.</p>
<p>Mental illness – particularly psychotic illness such as schizophrenia – is often blamed for public place murders. It is common for killers to be described in public discourse as “deranged”, for instance. In some cases, this is accurate. But although mental illness provides an “easy” explanation for lethal violence, evidence suggests that there are <a href="http://vitals.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/07/20/12858757-mass-murderers-often-not-mentally-ill-but-seeking-revenge-experts-say">many killings where mental illness is not present</a>. </p>
<p>Instead, perpetrators typically have a long and complex history of frustration, failure, and limited capacity to cope with setbacks and problems. They often “externalise” blame for those <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01639625.2014.951570#.Vd6vGvmqpBc">frustrations and failures</a> onto others. This process of externalising is how co-workers, peers, or society as a whole can become the targets for revenge. </p>
<p>Perpetrators tend to have limited family or social connections and support, and are often socially isolated. In many instances, a significant event such as job loss or relationship breakdown will precipitate the violence. However, that event is generally the culmination of a lengthy series of negative life events and circumstances.</p>
<p>In the Virginia case, it seems the perpetrator felt profound anger about racism and racial tensions. Based on the perpetrator’s own writings, the recent mass murder of nine African American churchgoers in Charleston seems to have been the catalyst for his acts. The experience of racism and race-based discrimination can, in itself, feed in to the commission of violence. </p>
<p>However, the perpetrator’s online expressions of hatred towards white Americans also raise the disturbing possibility that the killings may represent an extreme form of hate crime, with potentially deliberate selection of victims based on race. </p>
<p>Another factor that can motivate perpetrators of public acts of lethal violence is a desire to gain notoriety through media coverage of their deeds. For individuals whose lives have generally been characterised by obscurity and lack of success, the prospect of “everyone knowing their name” may be highly appealing. The Virginia perpetrator’s use of live TV, and then social media, to spread footage of the murders, exemplifies this desire for attention. </p>
<p>The perpetrator’s apparent admiration for past acts of lethal public violence, such as the Columbine massacre, is likely to spark debate about the role that media reporting of violence may play in spawning further violence. </p>
<p>It also raises questions about copycat killings – acts inspired by past crimes. Although copycat killings are a <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25443976">subject of ongoing debate in academic literature</a>, factors such as the amount of media attention given to murderers, or the highly specific and detailed way in which killings are reported have often been held up as areas of concern. </p>
<p>It is important that we look closely at responsible ways in which the media can report on violence. Also, because social media can make footage of lethal violence far more accessible to audiences than traditional forms of media, we need to carefully consider the ways viewing graphic violence may affect different members of the community. The occurrence of lethal violence is inherently confronting. </p>
<p>Over and above this, though, media and social media coverage of such violence can have further impacts on the public, for example through <a href="http://spx.sagepub.com/content/55/1/93.abstract">amplifying community perceptions</a> about the likelihood of becoming a victim of crime. This, in turn, can lead to heightened feelings of fear and anxiety. </p>
<p>Because the perpetrator took his own life as well as the lives of others, we may never know what motivated this act of appalling violence. But if we seek to understand why such acts occur, and to find ways to better prevent violence, we cannot attempt to reduce lethal violence down to one motivation, one root cause, or one solution. </p>
<p>The challenge ahead is whether, as a society, we are able to accept that despite the monstrous deeds some individuals may commit, they are nevertheless complex human beings – just like all of us.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/46734/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Samara McPhedran does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Classifying killers into particular types is intuitively appealing. It helps us make sense of what otherwise seems senseless. But this approach tells us only the smallest fraction of their motivation.Samara McPhedran, Senior Research Fellow, Violence Research and Prevention Program, Griffith UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/467282015-08-27T04:02:24Z2015-08-27T04:02:24ZVirginia TV shootings: murder as a media event<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/93108/original/image-20150827-15400-o4lmmy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">American journalists Alison Parker and Adam Ward were shot dead live on air, allegedly by a former colleague.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/WDBJ7</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/aug/26/virginia-gunman-kills-reporter-cameraman">macabre live murders</a> of Alison Parker and Adam Ward in Virginia are a chilling watershed. Whatever the shooter’s motivations, the idea that journalists are targets for infamy seekers is now an idea in our culture.</p>
<p>Reports that the alleged shooter, Vester Flanagan, <a href="http://hollywoodlife.com/2015/08/26/vester-flanagan-suicide-note-bryce-williams-wdbj-news-shooting-virginia/">praised other rampage murderers</a> connect this new outrage to an all-too-familiar theme. Here’s another example of gun crime as a media event. Murder as a script that murderers can easily act out for the world. </p>
<p>At first blush, we might wonder what such screened outrages do to evil, alienated and vulnerable people. Fair enough. But what about journalists and their profession?</p>
<p>That Parker and Ward’s colleagues were forced to instantaneously cover the slaughter of their own friends was a cruel exemplar of a more mundane truth: in the digital age, news is a live performance. WDBJ7 TV anchors were mercilessly obliged to balance trauma and professionalism; staying calm while grieving friends, and perhaps wondering why local news had become mediatised terror. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, there are many reasons to think that this unimaginable situation reflects global realities in news production.</p>
<p>Beyond the shock of the ghastly crime, the talk among journalists is about the upping of an ethical ante in a profession already facing unprecedented pressures. Sky News UK discussed the ethics and pragmatics of dealing with the footage of the crime. Different organisations have said “cut” in different places. The Daily Star, for example, <a href="http://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/latest-news/461363/Gunman-TV-reporter-cameraman-dead">showed images</a> that Sky eschewed. </p>
<p>Since these images were already circulating social media, the question “whither ethics?”, in a Twitter age, has been raised.</p>
<p>Today, there’s a terrible feeling that gates have been left open and horses have bolted over fields. If someone wants to create panic with a gun and a smartphone, they can. If journalists want to protect the public from disturbing images, they can’t. This is precisely why professional journalism is every bit as important as it has ever been.</p>
<p>So let’s appreciate that profession. Parker’s death poignantly illustrates one of the most significant findings of comparative journalism research – that journalism is a dangerous job, and those dangers often have a gender dimension. </p>
<p>Following the invasion of Iraq in 2003, job opportunities for local journalists abounded, largely because the role was too dangerous for those who had other options. Between 2003 and 2009, 139 journalists were <a href="https://www.questia.com/library/journal/1P3-2218937831/forces-of-gatekeeping-and-journalists-perceptions">killed</a> in the Iraqi conflict, of whom 117 were Iraqis. </p>
<p>Things were especially grim for women: attracted to journalism by high pay and high unemployment, they were threatened by the “double dip” risks of <a href="http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/intellect/jammr/2010/00000003/00000003/art00007">being Iraqi and female</a>. </p>
<p>Naturally there’s a world of difference between reporting on Fallujah and telling a local news story about tourism. Except, in both cases, the stories are told by people who have to negotiate a complex maze of technical skills and professional attributes in competitive markets where, in the end, the difference between good and bad depends on the skill of the person on the spot.</p>
<p>Seen this way, the dilemma the WDBJ7 news team faced was a savagely amplified version of the “problem” that journalists always face in stories that matter. Common sense dictates objectivity as the bottom line of good journalism. But evidence contrarily identifies subjectivity as the cornerstone of reporting excellence. A <a href="http://orca.cf.ac.uk/38253/">study</a> of Pulitzer Prize-winning writers revealed the ability to infuse stories with personality and emotion as a common trait. </p>
<p>We want our news to come from people who care about things, and know how to show it.</p>
<p>In a way, these “live” murders aren’t an aberration, in terms of the news processes. Forty years ago, media academics were keen to discover how journalism worked behind the scenes. Today, it happens on our screens; news teams struggle to edit and make sense of events as they happen, and stay cool as social media users break whatever story they want to break. Threats to journalistic integrity are <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=6SPnOXv6OhgC">legion</a>. </p>
<p>Which is why good journalists matter so much. When you let us all tell our own stories, we screw things up. <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?isbn=1135119511">Critics</a> say we live in a “post-truth” culture. Stories matter more than truth, and technology ensures that everybody’s got one. And can tell it. Everything gets reduced to screen images, so when we see the image of a murderer captured on a fallen camera, we think about The Blair Witch Project, not the death of a person.</p>
<p>Inevitably the days that follow will be filled with stories about copycat fears and gun culture. In this, let’s not forget the effects on journalists and the difficulties they face in protecting a job that isn’t just another kind of storytelling.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/46728/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andy Ruddock does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>If someone wants to create panic with a gun and a smartphone, they can. If journalists want to protect the public from disturbing images, they can’t.Andy Ruddock, Senior Lecturer, School of Media, Film and Journalism, Monash UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/467252015-08-27T00:00:08Z2015-08-27T00:00:08ZThe Virginia on-air shootings: all too real<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/93090/original/image-20150826-15400-zxk86u.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A screen shot of on-air shooting video before CNN decided to fade to black.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/26/us/virginia-shooting-wdbj/index.html">CNN</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In an interview with the New York Times Sunday Book Review this week, children’s author R.L. Stine <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/23/books/review/r-l-stine-by-the-book.html?_r=0">joked</a> that he never reads nonfiction: “I hate anything real.”</p>
<p>Stine could have been speaking for the legion of commentators who spoke out about the on-camera shooting of two journalists and an interviewee in Virginia on Wednesday. But apparently, he wouldn’t be speaking for many people in the media. </p>
<p>Fictional on-screen killings are as common as weather reports. Real ones are rare: Jack Ruby’s killing of Lee Harvey Oswald two days after Oswald shot President Kennedy and a suicide on a Los Angeles freeway in 1998 are among the few that viewers could see as they happened.</p>
<p>In such unfolding situations, TV station managers can argue that they had no way of knowing that the incident would end the way it did and could not cut away in time. The real controversy centers on re-broadcast of the ghastly footage.
Here, the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1987/01/23/us/official-calls-in-press-and-kills-himself.html">suicide</a> of Pennsylvania State Treasurer Budd Dwyer in 1987 enters the picture.</p>
<h2>What to show</h2>
<p>It was the day before Dwyer’s sentencing on fraud charges. He called a news conference in Harrisburg and after reading a statement, with cameras rolling, he put a gun in his mouth and fired.</p>
<p>Most Pennsylvania TV stations got the footage around a half-hour later. Most only showed Dwyer brandishing the gun. A couple showed him putting the gun in his mouth, but cut away before he pulled the trigger. Three showed him pulling the trigger.</p>
<p>A similar range of decisions was on display within the first few hours of the shooting of journalists Alison Parker and Adam Ward and local official Vicki Gardner in Moneta, Virginia.</p>
<p>At first, NBC News froze the video before the shooting started. “We’re not going to show you the entire sequence,” the anchor said. Later, though, the network posted a warning that the video “may be disturbing to some viewers,” then ran the entire clip.</p>
<p>CBS News warned viewers orally that the footage would be disturbing, then showed it.</p>
<p>ABC froze the video at the moment when Parker appeared to have been shot – perhaps the least palatable approach.
Not surprisingly, WDBJ-TV, the station Parker and Shaw worked for, shied away.</p>
<p>“We are choosing not to run the video of that right now,” station manager Jeff Marks <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/erik-wemple/wp/2015/08/26/wdbj-gm-we-are-choosing-not-to-run-the-video/">said</a>, “because frankly, we don’t need to see it again, and our staff doesn’t need to see it again.”</p>
<p>Which raises the fundamental question about such video: Does anybody need to see it?</p>
<p>Unlike the mainstream news organizations, social media managers decided that the answer was no: While the broadcast and cable giants showed the interview footage shot by Adam Ward for WDBJ, Facebook and Twitter took down the images recorded by shooter Vester Lee Flanagan on his cell phone.</p>
<h2>Media and copycats</h2>
<p>The question of how we are harmed by viewing real as opposed to staged violence is the main ethics issue raised by coverage of the shootings in Virginia, but there are others. One is the attention paid to the perpetrator.</p>
<p>During the spate of school shootings in the late 1990s, there was much discussion of whether news coverage of each incident spawned copycats. If, the thinking went, these shooters were motivated, in part, by the desire to see their faces and their words on the front pages of newspapers and in the lead stories on the evening news, perhaps news organizations would do better to ignore them and focus on the victims.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/93091/original/image-20150826-15407-1h0okl9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/93091/original/image-20150826-15407-1h0okl9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/93091/original/image-20150826-15407-1h0okl9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/93091/original/image-20150826-15407-1h0okl9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/93091/original/image-20150826-15407-1h0okl9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/93091/original/image-20150826-15407-1h0okl9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/93091/original/image-20150826-15407-1h0okl9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/93091/original/image-20150826-15407-1h0okl9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">The car of suspected gunman Vester L Flanagan, also known as Bryce Williams, off Highway I-66 in Virginia, hours after the shooting of two journalists.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">David Manning/Reuters</span></span>
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</figure>
<p>Yet, as ever, we are seeing multiple images of Flanagan, including a dramatic, if blurry shot of him firing his gun, and even a quote from a letter in which he expressed his admiration for the shooters at Columbine High School and Virginia Tech University.</p>
<p>As the afternoon wore on, ABC’s homepage led with “What we know about suspect in on-air shooting” and NBC’s with “Human Powder Keg: Gunman Says Discrimination.” </p>
<p>Certainly we humans have always been fascinated with the criminal mind – with what makes transgressors tick. But is the possible role of the news media in inspiring copycat criminals even part of the newsroom discussion anymore?</p>
<h2>False framing</h2>
<p>A third familiar issue raised by the coverage is the over-hastiness to report what has not yet been confirmed. As we saw with the coverage of the wounding of White House Press Secretary James Brady during the attempted assassination of President Reagan in 1981, and with the wounding of Representative Gabrielle Giffords in 2011, some outlets were reporting Flanagan’s death while others were telling us that he was in critical condition or that he “still had a pulse.”</p>
<p>Reporters were also quick to frame the story as part of a growing pattern of violence against journalists, but since the shooter turned out to be a journalist himself, this appears to be a case of a “disgruntled former employee” who just happened to be a journalist.</p>
<p>Finally, it is worth noting that in headline after headline, the incident is referred to as an “on-air” shooting. Clearly, the fact that this crime was committed as the camera rolled vastly increased its newsworthiness. </p>
<p>Horrified as we are, or claim to be, by real violence, televised real violence that we can watch as it unfolds is realer than real and, therefore, vastly more fascinating than the kind we find out about after the fact.</p>
<p>Or so the mainstream news media believes.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/46725/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Russell Frank does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Mainstream media and social media go different ways on the ethical questions raised by the airing of video showing on-camera shooting of journalists.Russell Frank, Associate Professor of Communications, Penn StateLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.