[quote name='dmaul1114']Exactly, I think violent media can influence people on their path to violence. Maybe being a small push, or maybe influencing choice of targets etc. But not cause them to commit violence. Same with political rhetoric.
So I just don't see much utility in focusing so much energy on violent media, political rhetoric etc. when we already have a crisis of having so little funding for criminal justice research and little emphasis on getting at the root causes of why we have so much violence relative to other first world countries.[/QUOTE]
I still disagree.
With violent videogames/movies/etc, everybody knows that they are manufactured. As in, somebody didn't actually die to make that scene and that it is all special effects (or in the case of videogames, completely fake). You could argue that it desensitizes people to violence but even the best videogame or special effects are far away from the real deal.
With political rhetoric and news pundits, it is not an act to most people. It is just the news. Something that some people trust completely. It's completely possible for them to get locked in an echo chamber where that is the only thing they hear. They can watch Glenn Beck on TV, listen to his radio show, read his books, talk on message boards about what he talks about with other followers. It can change a person. And while most people just stay frozen in fear and continue to buy all the merchandise, there is only so much "the liberals are destroying this country" and revolutionary type rhetoric an unstable person can take before they try to take action.
Now that most likely wasn't the case in this situation but the fact we are at a point where a person running for Senator can talk about "second amendment remedies
" and not get destroyed in the media by everybody...it is a toxic environment.
[quote name='that Salon article']Everyone uses battle-related language in politics, of course. "If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun," candidate Barack Obama said in 2008. Rahm Emanuel's comically exaggerated speech is the stuff of (probably embellished) legend. It's perfectly legitimate, if also often counterproductive and stupid, to pretend politics is blood sport.
I'd also say that while you can argue the wisdom of either, there's a difference between using the imagery of politics as street fight and employing revolutionary rhetoric. And when you combine standard-issue violent political language with the idea -- stated and reiterated by nearly every prominent right-wing politician and media figure since Obama took office -- that the opponent is not simply wrong, but has illegitimately seized power, and is illegally exercising that power, the inevitable question raised is, "What do we do to stop them?" The correct answer is supposed to be "vote Republican and keep watching Fox," of course, but a good midterm for the GOP hasn't dethroned the socialist usurper-in-chief.
It's not strictly that language tinged with violent imagery is dangerous, or that heated denunciations of the motivations of your political opponents are out of line, or even that America's pervasive gun fetishization is to blame (though our gun culture is insane and bizarre to every single other developed nation in the world) for violent crimes. But when elites don't just condone but participate in the combination of that violent imagery with the idea that the government represents an existential threat -- that representatives of the government are domestic enemies, that your liberty and even your physical safety are in danger -- the idea of political violence is normalized. Terrorizing Congress members at town halls and "we surround you" and head-stomping and death threats and all the other bad craziness just becomes "the way we do politics in America."
The crazies are listening to the same media that the rest of us are. Charles Alan Wilson, the man arrested last year for threatening the life of Sen. Patty Murray, used the same language as Glenn Beck in his insane voice mails to Murray's office and borrowed Sarah Palin's death panels meme. (He also had a concealed weapons permit and carried a loaded .38 special.) When everyone's hoisting guns and shouting "tyranny" and playing at being a revolutionary, there will be a couple of people who don't see the wink.[/QUOTE]
And I'm glad somebody brought up Rwanda. I've read many books about that situation and Radio Rwanda (plus other media) was one of the main things that set off that genocide.
- edit Also, I would say the fact this guy fell through the cracks after getting kicked out of college by crazy ranting during class (which didn't set off a red flag during a background check for his gun or force him to get mental help) is more important than the underfunding of criminal justice research