Following a shooting at a school in England in early 2009, a forensic psychiatrist told the BBC about his plea to media outlets worldwide:

If you don't want to propagate more mass murders...

Don't start the story with sirens blaring.

Don't have photographs of the killer.

Don't make this 24/7 coverage.

Do everything you can not to make the body count the lead story … not to make the killer some kind of anti-hero.

Do localize this story to the affected community and as boring as possible in every other market.

Why don’t we listen?

There is compelling evidence that the way we cover mass shootings, especially in America, gives too much attention to the shooter, in effect turning him into a celebrity and creating a perverse incentive for other social outcasts to seek the spotlight through carnage.

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