The Seven Stages of the Mass Media Reporting Cycle for Mass Killings

• In Event: Violence and Terrorism in the News

Abstract

This article identifies seven distinct mass media reporting cycles used in the coverage of mass killings and the inspiration they provide for future killers. Almost before the bullets stop flying a plethora of disinformation hits the airwaves often vilifying the innocent and lionizing the killer. Ethnographic content analysis was used to identify common and ordered stages/themes expressed through mass media accounts of the massacres committed by Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris (Columbine High School), Seung Hui Cho (Virginia Tech), James Holmes (Aurora Movie Theater), Adam Lanza (Sandy Hook Elementary School), and Elliot Roger (University of California, Santa Barbara). In addition each of these infamous killers reference/discuss their well publicized prior homicidal roll models in mounds of self created archival documents they leave behind. They do not just copycat prior killers, they are inspired by them and want to outdo them.

Author

• Jennifer Lynn Murray, Indiana State University