Media Gives Mass Murderer His Dying Wish

[Borodog]

The way the media is exploding the notoriety and infamy of this psychopath is revolting. They are giving him exactly what he wanted, and in my opinion by doing so they are greatly increasing the chances of copycats.

And no, I will not provide a link to the pictures or video. [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

[MuresanForMVP]

he looks and sounds like a complete crybaby pussy in those videos.

[Borodog]

I can see the advertising campaign now:

"NBC: The number one choice in news coverage among psychotic mass murderers."

[latefordinner]

How can the media be exploiting anything - aren't they simply providing their consumers what they want in the market? I thought there was no such thing as an "incorrect outcome" in the market?

[Borodog]

[ QUOTE ]
How can the media be exploiting anything - aren't they simply providing their consumers what they want in the market? I thought there was no such thing as an "incorrect outcome" in the market?

[/ QUOTE ]

Who said they were "exploiting anything"? Who said it was an objectively "incorrect outcome"? Am I not free to say that Macy Gray sucks just because she sells a lot of albums? Am I not free to criticize the choices made by a private business just because I believe in free markets?

Or is this just a chance for you to make a snarky remark?

Also, welcome to last year.

[latefordinner]

thanks for the thread link - obv I don't have the time to go back and reread a year's worth of threads so any references to discussions that have already taken place are welcome

sorry I read "exploding" as "exploiting". I wasn't being snarky for no reason, I was simply saying that in so many other posts you are so vehement about the fact that if a business is providing something and is profitable in a market it is proof that it is "good" - not in the sense of "good" as in "I like it" but "good" as in allowing people to freely choose what they want

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sure you are welcome to say hey that artist sucks, I think people that buy her albums have no taste, but in this case you are coming much closer to saying hey this news coverage sucks, I think society would be better off if they stopped showing this psychopath's face and playing his words 24/7

--
(start brief thread hijack)
I think this is a perfect example of the mystification/alienation of a capitalist system in that it obscurs the true social costs of production and consumption decisions so that people "rationally" choose something they wouldn't have rationally chosen in a much different socioeconomic system

eg; if an alien race came down to the US 100 years ago and said hey, we'll give you this fantastic technology that allows you to move places at 10 times the speed of your horse and buggies, but you have to hold a lottery every year and randomly select 100,000 people that we can kill, people would be like get the [censored] out of town

capitalists often refer to this cost obscuring as externalities and believe that the freer a market is, the more these externalities will be able to be internalized

i refer to them as the natural outgrowth of a socioeconomic system that incentivizes individual profit over social wellbeing

[goodsamaritan]

Don't worry about it too much Borodog. This is only a speed bump. By next week the media will be back to focusing on the truly important stuff:

[andyfox]

I have to agree. I heard conservaitve radio talk show host Hugh Hewitt castigate NBC for making hay out of this. I doubted he was right.

But I just watched Brian Williams and he was saying they would show more of the tapes on "Today" tomorrow morning. A teaser for this pornography! How disgusting.

If I were in charge of NBC news, I would go on the Nightly News and say the killer wanted the tapes and pictures to be shown. We, at NBC, will never do such a thing. We have turned everything over to the FBI and local authorities for them to use in their investigative work, and we will make the materials available to the families of the victims. We will only release these materials to the public if the families are unanimous in their wish that we do so.

[goodsamaritan]

[ QUOTE ]
I have to agree. I heard conservaitve radio talk show host Hugh Hewitt castigate NBC for making hay out of this. I doubted he was right.

But I just watched Brian Williams and he was saying they would show more of the tapes on "Today" tomorrow morning. A teaser for this pornography! How disgusting.

If I were in charge of NBC news, I would go on the Nightly News and say the killer wanted the tapes and pictures to be shown. We, at NBC, will never do such a thing. We have turned everything over to the FBI and local authorities for them to use in their invetigative work, and we will make the materials available to the families of the victims. We will only release these materials to the public if the families are unanimous in their wish that we do so.

[/ QUOTE ]

Honestly, I don't really give a [censored] what the families think about this particular issue. I am an interested in seeing what was going through the killers head. If the families are upset by the videos, they don't need to watch them. Whether or not I see the videos has virtually zero effect on the families.

Any time somebody does something evil on a fairly large or public scale, they are going to get a lot more fame then they deserve. But so what? We shouldn't deprive ourselves of information just because we don't want to give the killer the satisfaction. The killer is dead anyway, and since I don't believe in any kind of afterlife, the killer is not benefitting from these videos being shown at all.

Criticizing NBC for profiting from these videos is like criticizing the History Channel for profiting from a documentary about Hitler.

[ShakeZula06]

[ QUOTE ]
I thought there was no such thing as an "incorrect outcome" in the market?

[/ QUOTE ]
What Borodog is doing (critisizing a service that is subpar in his opinion) is essential to the success of a free market.