Gossiping About a Mass Murderer<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The news media's coverage of awful events like the Newtown shootings has often felt more like gossip than anything resembling actual journalism.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christandpopculture\/2012\/12\/gossiping-about-a-mass-murderer\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Gossiping About a Mass Murderer\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The news media's coverage of awful events like the Newtown shootings has often felt more like gossip than anything resembling actual journalism.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christandpopculture\/2012\/12\/gossiping-about-a-mass-murderer\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Christ and Pop Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2012-12-17T15:00:17+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2012-12-17T15:48:08+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Jason Morehead\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Jason Morehead\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christandpopculture\/2012\/12\/gossiping-about-a-mass-murderer\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christandpopculture\/2012\/12\/gossiping-about-a-mass-murderer\/\",\"name\":\"Gossiping About a Mass Murderer\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christandpopculture\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2012-12-17T15:00:17+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2012-12-17T15:48:08+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christandpopculture\/#\/schema\/person\/37866f912978aba01c775c555a6b5338\"},\"description\":\"The news media's coverage of awful events like the Newtown shootings has often felt more like gossip than anything resembling actual journalism.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christandpopculture\/2012\/12\/gossiping-about-a-mass-murderer\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christandpopculture\/2012\/12\/gossiping-about-a-mass-murderer\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christandpopculture\/2012\/12\/gossiping-about-a-mass-murderer\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christandpopculture\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Gossiping About a Mass Murderer\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christandpopculture\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christandpopculture\/\",\"name\":\"Christ and Pop Culture\",\"description\":\"Where the Christian faith meets the common knowledge of our age\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christandpopculture\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christandpopculture\/#\/schema\/person\/37866f912978aba01c775c555a6b5338\",\"name\":\"Jason Morehead\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christandpopculture\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/a84f229aedbb6d82c32060a21113a5a2?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/a84f229aedbb6d82c32060a21113a5a2?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Jason Morehead\"},\"description\":\"Jason Morehead lives in the lovely state of Nebraska with his wife, three children, zero pets, and a large collection of CDs, DVDs, books, and video games. 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{"id":28043,"date":"2012-12-17T08:00:17","date_gmt":"2012-12-17T15:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christandpopculture\/?p=28043"},"modified":"2012-12-17T08:48:08","modified_gmt":"2012-12-17T15:48:08","slug":"gossiping-about-a-mass-murderer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christandpopculture\/2012\/12\/gossiping-about-a-mass-murderer\/","title":{"rendered":"Gossiping About a Mass Murderer"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

When something as tragic and horrible as the recent school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut occurs,\u00a0our natural response is to try and comprehend it, to try and grasp its magnitude. We want to know what happened, how it happened, and why. Theories and ideas are tossed around, and as more details come to light, we latch on to them and see how they fit into our pre-existing narratives for the event. We want to make sense of the\u00a0senseless, to find some order in the chaos.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, in that rush to make sense, it\u2019s easy to get things wrong. The very nature of such a chaotic event means that it\u2019ll take time for all of the details to come to light completely, for the noise and commotion to die down enough for there to space and silence to process. But that\u2019s so hard to do in our internet-fueled, 24-hour-news climate. And that became apparent, once again, with Newtown.<\/p>\n

As soon as news of the shooting broke, one of the obvious questions asked was \u201cWho could do such a thing?\u201d Within the hour, news outlets announced that Ryan Lanza was the chief suspect, and that there was even a matching Facebook profile. Lanza\u2019s name and photo were posted on numerous sites including Gawker<\/em>, Fox News<\/em>, and The Huffington Post<\/em>, along with links to his Facebook profile. Internet mob justice soon took over<\/a>: Lanza\u2019s Facebook information was shared across the Internet, people with similar names and usernames were harassed, and even people who were Facebook friends with Lanza were criticized.<\/p>\n

And yet, everybody was wrong<\/strong><\/a>. The shooter\u2019s name was Adam Lanza<\/a>; Ryan was his brother, and had nothing to do with his brother\u2019s actions. (The most likely source of confusion was Adam had Ryan\u2019s ID on him when his body was found.)<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t the first time something like this has happened. Last July, after the theatre shootings in Aurora, Colorado, ABC\u2019s Brian Ross made speculations about the shooter\u2019s identity<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 and was roundly criticized for doing so. Criticism has been leveled at the news media this time, as well \u2014 but I don\u2019t think any of us deny that it\u2019ll happen again. It\u2019s just too easy to engage in such behavior. And yet, we need to hold ourselves \u2014 and our news media \u2014 to higher standards than that.<\/p>\n

As I\u2019ve written\u00a0 before<\/a>, journalism can be a powerful tool for showing the world as it is, for telling the truth. But the news media\u2019s coverage of awful events like the Newtown shootings often feels more like gossip than anything resembling actual journalism.\u00a0Gossip, though it seems to be concerned with spreading the truth, actually makes us more cynical about the truth, for it allows us to structure our own preferred narratives regardless of reality. And those narratives encourage us to be arrogant, rebellious, and self-righteous, even as we spread lies about our neighbors. And it\u2019s just as wicked for news outlets to engage in it, as it is for us as individuals.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"