‘It isn’t helpful’: how media and mass shootings may reinforce each other

A crowd mourns the victims of the mass shooting at the Robb elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, in 2022. Photograph: Sara Diggins/AP

News coverage of high-profile mass shootings on American cable news has adopted near clockwork patterns: first comes shock and the scramble for information, followed by calls from communities and legislators for new gun restrictions, then reporting and speculation about the motives of the shooter (“Is evil or mental illness to blame?”). The remainder of the time is spent toggling between analysis of why the US sees these shootings so regularly, how the shooter got their gun and which signs of violence could have been noticed earlier.

Rinse and repeat.