When a mass shooting happens at a school, which it did just days ago in Santa Fe, Texas (near Houston), there are political debates about what should be done to prevent such horrible loss of life again. I won’t get into all of that here, but as someone that once made my living as a journalist, and now does it as a volunteer effort, I have been paying close attention to a debate over how news organizations should cover these terrible events.
You may have noticed something different about how the Santa Fe shooting has been covered. It has to do with the person alleged to have committed the crime. You are not seeing and hearing his name nearly as often. There is a reason for that.
Family members of past school shooting victims have been making their case to news organizations, and their argument goes something like this – do not name the suspect. Do not name the person at all.
Their view is that the instant celebrity status of suspects is part of the reason these shootings happen. I’m not sure that is entirely true, but it is one aspect to be considered.
In a recent edition of the professional journal American Behavioral Scientist, a criminal justice professor at the University of Alabama, Adam Lankford, makes a strong case that the media should report every detail of mass shootings, with one important exception – the suspects. Lankford argues that the media should refrain from naming or showing pictures of those charged with such a crime.
The media have a balancing act to perform here. The public has a right to know, but most news organizations strive to do so in an ethical manner. I do not believe there should be self-censorship on the part of reporters and editors. However, taking a look at how we report is important.
Reading and watching the coverage of the Santa Fe school shooting, which claimed the lives of 10 and injured 10, I have seen some changes in the major media outlets. They are naming the suspect and showing his picture, but not nearly as often as in the past.
I believe it was CNN that, early in its coverage, showed a picture and the name of the suspect, but let the audience know CNN does not plan to use that information much in the future. That is the direct result of internal debates and discussions about how to cover these tragedies.
It is very sad that these mass shootings continue to happen so often newsrooms are required to plan for how the coverage will be done. I do expect more refinements about how the mainstream media outlets continue to handle naming the suspect.
In the age of the Internet, even if the major media companies decide to restrain their use of the suspect’s name and picture, anyone can get on Google and find out all those details. But even understanding that, I am very glad the news business is reacting to the critiques of past coverage.
This may be a bit tricky in the future, especially because the Santa Fe, Texas suspect did not commit suicide and, if there is no guilty plea, there will be a trial and the media is obligated to cover that. Keeping the suspect’s name and likeness out of the trial coverage will be difficult, but not impossible.
Anyone writing news stories, whether you work for the New York Times or write on a small, local news blog like mine, needs to think long and hard about the ethics of reporting certain information. I think the changes in handling the naming of a mass shooting suspects is a move in the right direction.