Experimental Writing On Recent Mass Shootings

2021 ◽  
pp. 194084472110495
Author(s):  
Kurt Borchard
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
News Media ◽  
The United States ◽  
Experimental Writing ◽  
Mass Shootings ◽  
Media Attention ◽  
News Sources ◽  
Mass Shooting ◽  
Compare And Contrast

In 2017 the author published a poem about a mass shooting in Orlando where forty-nine people died. Two shootings in March 2021 in Atlanta and Boulder, where eighteen people total were killed, have since garnered national news media attention. But mass shootings are more common than nationally reported. A Wikipedia page, titled “List of Mass Shootings in the United States 2021,” states that there were over one-hundred shootings involving four or more victims in the first three months of this year. The author here uses a compare and contrast list, recent headlines and quotes from news sources, and speculative scenarios to consider again this highly familiar and durable trope in American news.

Are the Deadliest Mass Shootings Preventable? An Assessment of Leakage, Information Reported to Law Enforcement, and Firearms Acquisition Prior to Attacks in the United States

2019 ◽  
Vol 35 (3) ◽  
pp. 315-341 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adam Lankford ◽  
Krista Grace Adkins ◽  
Eric Madfis
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Law Enforcement ◽  
The United States ◽  
Warning Signs ◽  
Federal Bureau ◽  
Specific Interest ◽  
Mass Shootings ◽  
The Public ◽  
Active Shooters ◽  
Mass Shooting

This study examined the 15 deadliest public mass shootings in the United States from March 1998 to February 2018 to assess (a) leakage of violent thoughts/intent, (b) leakage of specific interest in mass killing, (c) concerning behaviors reported to law enforcement, (d) concerning interest in homicide reported to law enforcement, and (e) firearms acquisition. We then compared our findings on the deadliest public mass shooters with the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) findings on active shooters in general. Overall, the results suggest that most incidents were indeed preventable based on information known about offenders in advance, and that the deadliest mass shooters exhibited more warning signs and were more often reported to law enforcement than other active shooters. Future prevention efforts should aim to educate, encourage, and pressure the public to report warning signs to law enforcement, educate and train law enforcement so that they can more effectively investigate potential threats, and limit firearms access for people who have admitted having homicidal or suicidal thoughts or being interested in committing a mass shooting. These relatively straightforward steps could significantly reduce the prevalence of future attacks.

A Historical Perspective on the “Mental Illness as Motive” Narrative

2020 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 34-62
Author(s):  
Cassandra Kearney
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Mental Illness ◽  
News Media ◽  
Historical Perspective ◽  
Perceived Threat ◽  
Mass Shootings ◽  
The Public ◽  
Historical Significance ◽  
Mass Shooting ◽  
The Media

In an effort to better understand the historical significance of the “mental illness as motive” narrative, this essay investigates what has been recognized as the first mass shooting in the modern United States—Howard Unruh’s 1949 mass shoot¬ing in Camden, New Jersey. Given that mass shootings were an unprecedented phenomenon, the news media played an important role in explaining the event. As will be shown, many Americans felt uncertain about how mental illness man¬ifested and who was vulnerable. Given the often undisclosed, albeit perceived threat of schizophrenia, the public needed reassurance that there would be some indicator of insanity. Accordingly, the media used evidence of religious fanaticism and unfavorable physical descriptions of Unruh to cast him as separate, outside, or an “other.” Ultimately, the media’s rhetorical choices differentiated Unruh and attempted to make mental illness easier to identify for an audience afraid of its influence.

scholarly journals Fighting National Amnesia: Profiling Public Attention to Mass Shootings in The United States

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Miles Chandler
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Public Perception ◽  
The United States ◽  
Gun Control ◽  
Decay Length ◽  
Public Attention ◽  
Mass Shootings ◽  
Search Volume ◽  
Mass Shooting

This study aims to identify factors that shape public perception and emotional response to mass shootings in the United States. I suggest that patterns of media coverage inform public consciousness and collective emotion. Newsworthiness and gatekeeping theories assert that school or prejudicial shootings and those with more victims are reported on at higher rates. Literature on racial and immigrant bias in media demonstrates that non-white shooters also generate more discourse. The directed construction of shootings and the affective public responses they generate align well with the concept of a “moral panic.” Using all valid cases from the Mother Jones Mass Shootings:1982-2019 dataset which align temporally with Google Trends data, I analyze the volume and decay rate of search topics “mass shooting,” “gun control,” and “open carry,” following US mass shootings from 2004-2019. Shootings with more victims predict a higher volume of searches for “mass shooting,” and shorter search periods for “gun control” and “open carry.” Shootings with educational and religious targets had no significant effects on search patterns. Workplace shootings result in longer search periods for “mass shooting,” and shorter periods for “gun control.” Non-white shooters generate shorter search decay for “open carry.” The results support theories of media gatekeeping, suggesting events with more casualties generate more intense public attention. The consistent negative correlation between search volume and decay length suggests that sensational responses to shootings are not sustainable over long periods of time and prohibit pragmatically addressing mass shootings.

An Exploration of Female Mass Shooters

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jason Silva ◽  
Margaret Schmuhl
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
The United States ◽  
Mass Murder ◽  
Research Note ◽  
Descriptive Statistics ◽  
Mass Shootings ◽  
Mass Shooting ◽  
And Gender

This research note provides an exploratory examination of female mass shooters in the United States between 1979 and 2019. Specifically, this work provides descriptive statistics of perpetrator, motivation, and incident characteristics. Findings indicate female mass shooters more closely align with male mass shooters than general female homicide and mass murder offenders. The most valuable findings indicate female mass shooters are not motivated by relationship disputes, they often target the workplace, and they are more likely to work in dyads, especially when engaging in ideologically motivated attacks. A discussion of findings provides insight for mass shooting and gender scholars, as well as practitioners seeking to understand female involvement in mass shootings.

Defining Mass Shootings

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-18
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
The United States ◽  
School Shootings ◽  
Mass Shootings ◽  
Public Places ◽  
Post Offices ◽  
National Characteristics ◽  
Mass Shooting ◽  
History Of

This chapter interrogates public understandings of mass shootings. First of all, gun violence statistics for the United States are compared with those in other developed countries. The varying definitions and trends of mass shooting are shown to be problematic in trying to gain an accurate understanding of the phenomenon. Discussed is the history of mass shootings in the United States from “going postal” attacks occurring in post offices and workplace massacres through to school shootings and mass shootings in public places. Possible reasons why the United States has the highest number of mass shootings are deliberated. Hofstede's often-quoted cultural model is used to discuss two national characteristics: high levels of individualism and low power distance between social groups. Other factors highlighted relate to Harding, Fox, and Mehta's model about influencers of school shootings, as well as notions of extreme masculinity which are often expressed via misogynistic behavior.

Mother Knows Best

2020 ◽  
pp. 41-55 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gordon Arthur Crews ◽  
Garrison Allen Crews
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Open Source ◽  
Data Base ◽  
The United States ◽  
Mass Shootings ◽  
Public Places ◽  
Movie Theater ◽  
Rampage Shootings ◽  
Mass Shooting ◽  
Violent Events

In the aftermath of the movie theater mass shooting in July of 2012 in Aurora, Colorado, Mother Jones magazine created one of the first open-source databases documenting mass shootings in the United States. They focused on documenting rampage shootings in public places which resulted in four or more victims killed by the attacker(s). Their initial database consisted of incidents between 1982 and 2012, then an additional 54 cases were added to this data base of incidents which occurred between 2013 and August 2019. The purpose of this chapter is to analyze the incidents gathered in this complete database from 1982 to 2019. Special attention is given to overall trends and characteristics of types of offenders, events, and weapons used in such violent events.

scholarly journals The role of domestic violence in fatal mass shootings in the United States, 2014–2019

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Lisa B. Geller ◽  
Marisa Booty ◽  
Cassandra K. Crifasi
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Domestic Violence ◽  
Family Member ◽  
Family Members ◽  
Case Fatality ◽  
The United States ◽  
Mass Shootings ◽  
Mass Shooting ◽  
History Of

Abstract Background Fatal mass shootings, defined as four or more people killed by gunfire, excluding the perpetrator, account for a small percentage of firearm homicide fatalities. Research has not extensively focused on the role of domestic violence (DV) in mass shootings in the United States. This study explores the role of DV in mass shootings in the United States. Methods Using 2014–2019 mass shooting data from the Gun Violence Archive, we indexed our data by year and mass shooting and collected the number of deaths and injuries. We reviewed news articles for each mass shooting to determine if it was 1) DV-related (i.e., at least one victim of a mass shooting was a dating partner or family member of the perpetrator); 2) history of DV (i.e., the perpetrator had a history of DV but the mass shooting was not directed toward partners or family members); or 3) non-DV-related (i.e., the victims were not partners or family members, nor was there mention of the perpetrator having a history of DV). We conducted descriptive analyses to summarize the percent of mass shootings that were DV-related, history of DV, or non-DV-related, and analyzed how many perpetrators died during the incidents. We conducted one-way ANOVA to examine whether there were differences in the average number of injuries or fatalities or the case fatality rates (CFR) between the three categories. One outlier and 17 cases with unknown perpetrators were excluded from our main analysis. Results We found that 59.1% of mass shootings between 2014 and 2019 were DV-related and in 68.2% of mass shootings, the perpetrator either killed at least one partner or family member or had a history of DV. We found significant differences in the average number of injuries and fatalities between DV and history of DV shootings and a higher average case fatality rate associated with DV-related mass shootings (83.7%) than non-DV-related (63.1%) or history of DV mass shootings (53.8%). Fifty-five perpetrators died during the shootings; 39 (70.9%) died by firearm suicide, 15 (27.3%) were killed by police, and 1 (1.8%) died from an intentional overdose. Conclusions Most mass shootings are related to DV. DV-related shootings had higher CFR than those unrelated to DV. Given these findings, restricting access to guns by perpetrators of DV may affect the occurrence of mass shootings and associated casualties.

scholarly journals Assessing the contagiousness of mass shootings with nonparametric Hawkes processes

PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. e0248437
Author(s):  
Peter Boyd ◽  
James Molyneux
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Point Process ◽  
News Media ◽  
The United States ◽  
Gun Violence ◽  
Process Models ◽  
Mass Shootings ◽  
Hawkes Processes ◽  
High Profile ◽  
Point Process Models

Gun violence and mass shootings are high-profile epidemiological issues facing the United States with questions regarding their contagiousness gaining prevalence in news media. Through the use of nonparametric Hawkes processes, we examine the evidence for the existence of contagiousness within a catalog of mass shootings and highlight the broader benefits of using such nonparametric point process models in modeling the occurrence of such events.

Australian Mass Shootings: An Analysis of Incidents and Offenders

2017 ◽  
Vol 35 (19-20) ◽  
pp. 3939-3962
Author(s):  
Samara McPhedran
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Mental Illness ◽  
Policy Development ◽  
Life Histories ◽  
The United States ◽  
Life Stressors ◽  
Mass Shootings ◽  
International Policy ◽  
New Information ◽  
Mass Shooting

Mass shooting events are relatively underresearched, and most study comes from the United States. Despite significant international interest, little is known about other countries’ experiences of these events. The current study examines Australian mass shooting incidents and offenders, with emphasis on mental illness, life strains, and offenders’ life histories. Australia had 14 mass shootings between 1964 and 2014. Most offenders experienced acute life stressors and/or chronic strains leading up to the event; however, diagnosed mental illness was less commonly documented. These observations provide new information about mass shooting incidents and offenders, and can help to inform international policy development.

Media Salience and Mass Murder

2018 ◽  
pp. 129-153 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jaclyn Schildkraut ◽  
Glenn W. Muschert
Keyword(s):  
News Media ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
The United States ◽  
Mass Murder ◽  
Time Dimension ◽  
Mass Shootings ◽  
Space Frames ◽  
Columbine High School ◽  
Mass Shooting ◽  
The Media

Mass shootings in the United States continue to be a cause for national concern both for the public and politicians alike. A key component in this pervasive discourse is the news media, which, since most people never will directly experience a mass shooting or other episodic violent crime, acts as the main source for information about these and other crime events. The present study analyzes the media coverage and framing patterns of 12 years of public mass shootings following the 1999 attack at Columbine High School. A two-dimensional analytic model is used to examine framing at both the spatial and temporal levels. The findings indicate that while the framing across the time dimension remains consistent with previous research, the use of the space frames departs from previous research, indicating a shift in the coverage. These findings and their associated implications for policy responses to mass shootings also are considered.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document