Let's Go "Inside The Mind Of A Killer" - NBC's Lame Excuse

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(A continuation of my earlier thread on this story, here)

From the moment that some of the major details of the Virginia Tech tragedy began unfolding, it was clear that something more than merely another school shooting was afoot. Once it was revealed that this mass murderer didn't just snap, but had been planning this massacre for weeks, the carnage took on a new, ghastly dimension.

Last night, I would argue, the story took on an even more horrific dimension, when NBC News decided to essentially honor Cho Seung-Hui's fervent desire to be immortalized not only for having committed the worst shooting spree in American history, but to air the video rants that he made in the hours and days before he acted on his madness.

NBC could have simply informed its viewers that it had received a package from Seung-Hui containing said rants, and run text or narrative excerpts. They did not have to give him the platform to reach out from beyond the grave, to justify his mass murder, in the most powerful media of our time: video.


Instead, NBC News gave him exactly what he wanted. And they continue to show Seung-Hui's video rants over, and over, and over again.

Here's how the top dog at NBC News justified his decision --- in reaction to the fact that a number of victims' family members canceled scheduled appearances on NBC's "Today Show":

While NBC acknowledged that the material from Cho were likely devastating to the victims' families and that its news division was split over whether to air the material, NBC News President Steve Capus defended the decision to do so, arguing it only showed a small amount of the images they received.

"This is I think as close as we will ever come to being inside of the mind of a killer, and I thought that it needed to be released," he said on MSNBC. "Pretty much every single news organization all around the world has made the same decision, that it was appropriate to release this information."

I see. So now, if every "news" organization from the National Enquirer to all the tyrant-controlled media outlets in the Middle East and beyond decides it's A-OK to show the rants of a madman on TV, then NBC will now cater to and vindicate itself by racing to align itself with these lowest common denominators.

Well, as a quiet little voice in the blogosphere, I have a question for NBC News:

If you are so intent on getting "inside the mind" of those who can shed some relevant light on this tragedy, how about going inside the minds of America's Founding Fathers, and their reasoning for insisting that the right to keep and bear arms for the purpose of self-defense be placed so prominently in the Bill of Rights in the U.S. Constitution? Especially given:

1. The militant groupthink that erupted in newsrooms from coast to coast and around the world as soon as this story broke, in which people who are disguised as "journalists" became militant propagandists for "gun control"? (For comprehensive coverage of this, please refer to NewsBusters.org - they are ALL over this). For essentially acting as propagandists for Democrats and leftists, in what is anticipated to become the "Gun Crime Victim Disarmament Act Of 2007," to legally prevent people in the positions of the VA Tech students, professors and administrators from fighting back with lethal force against the next murderer who goes on a rampage?
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2. The fact that for the past 30 years, the "news" media has steadfastly refused to show Americans the innumerable instances in which individuals have stopped acts of violence by using --- gasp! --- firearms, instead of running endless, breathless repeats of stories on "gun violence"?
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3. The fact that 95% of American adults cannot answer 10 of the most basic questions about the U.S. Constitution, and nearly 70% now believe (or don't know if) it contains Karl Marx's communist principle, "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs" (up from 45% in 1987)?
   (Sources: Center for Survey Research & Analysis, University of Connecticut, “The State Of The First Amendment, 2001”; Caravan Group’s 2002 survey of 1012 U.S. adults 18 and older, for Columbia Law School, cited in “Americans Don’t Know Their Constitution: Columbia Law Survey Finds Confusion Over Founding Fathers vs. Karl Marx”; “The American Public's Knowledge of the U.S. Constitution: A Hearst Report,” 1987)

Do you think these facts are irrelevant? They are crucially relevant: The ignorance and misconceptions they indicate lie at the heart of what supposeldy now constitutes the "strong public support" for "sensible gun control" (codespeak for making it much more difficult, if not impossible for law-abiding Americans to obtain and use firearms to protect themselves, their families and other innocent victims).

And the sickest, most grimly ironic thing about this decision by NBC News to endlessly run Cho Seung-Hui's rants, is that if the American left actually does succeed in resurrecting the "Fairness Doctrine," people like me will insist on getting air- and print-time to expose the above, and answer the following:

• What influences fomented Seung-Hui's hatred of our "debauchery-laden" culture, of wealth, of accomplishment, of freedom? Could it have been his teachers and professors? I mean, the militant Marxist ideology that has conquered our college campuses has absolutley nothing to do with the "blame-America-first" mentality, right?
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• What role did mindless, violence-glorifying, America-bashing movies, music and video games (produced by companies that are almost invariably controlled, dominated and defended by the left --- just as is the "news media") play in sparking this tragedy? Apparently, more than the mainstream media is willing to concede at this point.
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• What kind of insane mind believes that by advertising a 2,600-acre campus as a "gun-free zone" would dissuade murderers from attacking it --- as was the case at VA Tech? (For more information on this insanity, please see my other post, here)

Yes, I would like to go "inside the minds" of the people and institutions that had a far greater influence on the VA Tech tragedy than anyone in the news media is willing to acknowledge at this point.

Then, let's see NBC News President Steve Capus and others in positions of leadership in the news media try to defend the indefensible --- chiefly their militant lock-step march to present only one side of tragedies like this, which invariably point in one direction: to the loss of freedom, of the right of self-defense, and of the mentality that we must look to the state for every last thing that our lives are missing, or that we feel (or are taught that) we are "entitled to."

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UPDATE: ABC PSYCHIATRIST WEIGHS IN - SHOWING VIDEO WAS "SOCIAL CATASTROPHE"

Hat tip to a sharp JQWorld reader ("MTB"). Read it all here. Perhaps there is some hope for the American news media to wake up and start applying some standard of reason to their decisions.

Original content is © Copyright 2007 by Jon Quixote. Email to jonquix@hotmail.com

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