Life Imitates Art

Film still from Franklin J. Schaffner's “The Best Man”—1964 from United Artists.

“The Walk Through”

As noted downpage, I assisted the gator-ific one and “Tokyo Terri” (one of my favorite commenters here and a damned hard worker for progressive causes on the internets in her own right) a little bit with their impromptu video “get” of Dr. Howard Dean for the “Unofficial Netroots Nation Podcast” down here in Austin.

One minute I was at our table watching Gen. Wesley Clark winding up his speech in rollicking fashion and the very funny Baratunde Thurston who bridged the speakers with some hilarious and pointed political stand-up, and the next minute, there was an advance person/assistant to Dr. Dean appearing magically in a puff of burnt Orange Netroot smoke, quickly informing T and Gator that “The Fifty-State Strategy Man” was now miraculously available for the interview—but...it would have to be quick and and an “on a dime turn-about” would be required as he was scheduled next at the podium to speak.

What followed was the “art-y” part. As the video camera being used was a relatively new-ish one, it was still in the process of being set-up which when under time constraints can only cause problems, thus, I volunteered my help with that, being an inveterate A/V geek and suddenly, we were off—out of the main hall and being led down the corridor where another very important person with a walkie-talkie awaited near a closed door. We were quickly ushered in, and then...an eerie feeling of dejá vu kicked in.

I don't know if you've ever seen the 1964 film “The Best Man”,, starring Henry Fonda (and if you haven't—you should. It'll be on Turner Classic Movies Aug. 24th @ 12 a.m. and on Sept. 3rd @ 12:15 a.m.) as the earnest, honest-to-a-fault “William Russell”, a clearly liberal candidate for president, with of course, the one tragic flaw—he'd been institutionalized for a nervous breakdown some time before, and it had also damaged his marriage. His opponent was Cliff Robertson's “Joe Cantwell”, a feral attack dog of a right-winger who'll stop at nothing to get elected—and he too, has a secret, as he'd apparently engaged in...ahem!, “The love that dares not speak its name” while in the army during WW2. The movie (Based on Gore Vidal's hit Broadway Play) is one of the best filmed treatments of the modern political game, focusing on the unseen glad-handing, horse-trading, hypocrisy, conventioneer-ing, and all manner of back-room dealing innate to the “game”. It was lensed in that stark “Manchurian Candidate” black and white style on location in the guts and bowels of the old Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles (where RFK would be killed a mere four years later), and the film is chock-full of these odd, shadowy back-of-the-building shots—tall unused ballrooms and long, echoing gray corridors, piping and ducts and all of the unglamorous building innards where the main characters skulked and plotted and met from time to time to measure each other like street-bred dogs facing off.

We were led through just such a labyrinth of rooms and corridors on our way to Dr. Dean. It was eerie. The rooms and hallways were a deep, stoney gray, with more echo than a Tommy James & The Shondells record. The occasional bark of a walkie-talkie could be heard as we were led left, right...Then left again and once again right to meet with and interview the former governor.

It looked exactly like that creepy, cavernous maze of rooms they shot “The Best Man” in. I kept waiting for the movie's director, to rise suddenly on the end of a big Chapman crane and yell “Cut!”. But this wasn't a movie. It was quite real.

We got to Dr. Dean, but of course the camera was balky and we missed that opportunity, but were granted a second chance after his speech, which came rather quickly.

He was ebullient, affable and as down-to-earth as could be. You couldn't help but notice his real fondness for the politically activated folks on the internet. He doesn't say “No” when people approach him—which for the thankless jobs of handlers and assistants, understandably makes them a little bit crazy. There are schedules and appearances to be maintained, and when you have a garrulous and open person like him to hold to the “every second counts” level of getting about, it can be difficult. (Bill Clinton is also notorious for this—even moreso in fact.) Nevertheless, good cheer was maintained and the interview went well.

But I couldn't help but notice those surroundings on our way to interview him. There was no magic, donut-stuffed green room or make-up people wielding puffs and powders and the like. It was furtive hustling about, no glamour. You run, you brief one another—it is on the fly. Big gray rooms and chugging forklifts. Echoing halls and harsh fluorescent lights. Barking, squalling walkie-talkies and the crispy sound of handlers necks snapping from repeatedly whipping downward to check watches and back up at their person.

What you see up front on CNN and MSNBC, the talking head perfectly centered before a green screen where a DC backdrop is popped in is the end result.

The guts is all the rushing to and fro through cavernous hallways, past kitchens and loading bays.

Got a chance to experience a little bit of the political game up close...back rooms and all.

Amazing stuff. And real.

There's more...

$500 and Only 42.5 Hours Left

Doonesbury. October 30, 2005. Click for LARGE.

Let's Finish Up TODAY

Recap of yesterday's post:

$1,000 To Go, Three Days Left

Saturday we got slammed with $1,000.00 in unexpected expenses.
Yesterday we set out to raise $300+ daily: Sunday, Monday and Tuesday.

We asked you to donate generously... and guess what?

• You didn't come in at 25% -- a quarter.
• You didn't give at $300+ -- a third as we had asked.
• You didn't even give at 40%...

HALF. You donated HALF.
Yesterday, Sunday, our second slowest day of the week, you folks gave HALF the funds we need.

You rock. You rock hard.

Today is Monday, our best circulation day of the week. Let's end this today and not wait till tomorrow.

Please contribute right now. Let's close this out. We accept credit cards, checks, and PayPal, and you can also mail us a check or money order.

PayPal or credit card:

Group News Blog
PO Box 809
Bellevue WA 98009

Give what you can: $200, $100, $75, $50, the number you know is right.

We have under 42 and a half hours left to raise $500.00. Let's do it TODAY.

We ask, request, invite, and urge you to donate NOW.

GNB is here for you no matter what or if you donate. We care and honor you, and we thank you.

You are the best.

Update: 1/10 pm/am ET/PT

We're at $125 so far today.

PLEASE, please, donate what you can.

Only $375 to go and GNB fundraising is over till Jan.

More importantly, we will be fixed for the Democratic convention.

Please give now. We're almost there. Let's close this out today!


Update: 4/1 pm ET/PT

Climbing sloooowly. Up to $185 today.

We have $315 to go.

Come on folks. YOU CAN DO IT.

I'm going to the dentist now. Hubris asks for your help next.

Please... Make this happen TODAY.

There's more...

$1,000 To Go, Three Days Left

LOLCAT Weekly Roundup, courtesy of Maggie Jochild's Meta Watershed.

Help GNB Raise $1,000 in 72 Hours!

Our fundraising drive ends Tuesday at midnight.

You've done wonderfully. We've hit every financial checkpoint we hoped for. I'd planned on doing some nice comments today asking for donations, letting someone else drive Monday, and then closing out Tuesday with a round of very sincere Thank You very much.

All changed Saturday (yesterday): a call mid-day & an email at 9:51 PM Pacific Time. GNB was hit with two huge, unexpected convention expenses, both good news. The first one I can't talk about till Tuesday (it's embargoed.) The second one is OTR (Off The Record.) I can't talk about it in detail at all. I will say I'd given up hope it would happen (which is why it was out of the budget.) Now it is happening, suddenly and without warning, which is fracking WONDERFUL. But expensive.

Here are the numbers.

a) $400.00 -- Story on this Embargoed till Tuesday
b) $350.00 -- Off The Record but VERY good news.
---------------
$750.00 -- Unexpected non-budgeted unavoidable expenses.
$250.00 -- Bare minimum we budgeted to raise Sunday through Tuesday.
---------------
$1,000.00 -- TOTAL we MUST raise in 72 hours. Er... 70 hours 10 minutes.

You have been AMAZING.

Wonderful.

The best ever. People can only do what they can do. I completely get this.

This isn't a trick. It isn't any funny business. It's what happened.

Back on Monday in These Boys Are Sexy I told you we are on a tight budget. We are. Every hundred dollars we don't raise comes out of our own pockets. The Denver budget is painfully tight.

I believe in trusting people with facts and letting them choose:

• Fact. We just took a hit.
• Fact. Y'all have donated your ASS off for eleven days.
• Fact. To make our nut, we now need $1,000.00 by Tuesday midnight.
  

• Interpretation: This "breakdown" is really, no shit, good news. It means GNB will be able to give you BETTER, richer, team coverage than we'd expected from Denver.
  

• The story's embargoed now -- on Tuesday in my final fundraising post I'll explain precisely how your donations will big-time increase our Denver coverage way past what we thought possible. Red hot exciting!
  

All I can say now is please... Dig deep. We accept credit cards, checks, and PayPal, and you can also mail us a check or money order.

PayPal or credit card:

Group News Blog
PO Box 809
Bellevue WA 98009

Give what you can: $150, $100, $75, $50, whatever number you know is right.

We have 70 hours and 10 minutes left to raise $1,000.00. It's the way it is.

We ask that you donate. Regardless, know we always love and appreciate you. This is home.

Thank you.


Update: 12:30 pm/9:30 am ET/PT

$135 so far this morning. You are SO GREAT. Go GNBers GO!

We need to get to at least $3oo today.

Who is next? Who will kick in $75, $50, $25 right now? Or $100? Woo-hoo!


Update: 4:30/1:30 pm ET/PT

We've had TWO people qualify since Minstrel Boy made his book offer.

The first person generously contributed his prize back to the community AND offered to donate yet another book as a fundraising bonus -- which we will probably give away tomorrow.

You've raised $240 so far today. GOOD FOR YOU!
We need to be at least to $300 by day's end. At least.

Who can contribute right now to get us almost a third of the way to Denver?

One reader with $60 would handle today. Or two with $30 each...

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Breaking: Final Day of Denver @ MILE HIGH

View Larger Map

Obama's Acceptance Speech at INVESCO Field at Mile High

In a break with tradition, the Democratic National Convention Committee announced today the final day of the convention, Thursday, August 28, 2008, will be held at INVESCO Field at Mile High, including Senator Barack Obama's acceptance speech. INVESCO Field holds more than 75,000 people.

Democratic National Convention Committee

“The Democratic Party is nominating a true change candidate this August, and it is only fitting that we make some big changes in how we put on the Convention,” said Governor Howard Dean, Chairman of the Democratic National Committee (DNC). “Senator Obama’s candidacy has generated an enormous amount of excitement and interest, not only in the Democratic Party but also in the 2008 Convention. By bringing the last night of the Convention out to the people, we will be able to showcase Barack Obama’s positive, people-centered vision for our country in a big way. ”

“Barack Obama’s campaign for change has inspired millions of Americans and brought people into the political process who might never have been involved,” said Convention Co-Chair Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius. “This change in the Convention program will allow thousands of first-time participants a chance to take part. I can’t think of a better Convention finale for our nominee who has made reaching out to voters a hallmark of his campaign.”

Primetime Convention activities Monday, August 25 through Wednesday, August 27 will continue to be held at the Pepsi Center. The final day of the Convention on Thursday, August 28, including the nomination acceptance speech of Senator Barack Obama, will be held at INVESCO Field at Mile High, also located in downtown Denver. Daytime Convention events, including meetings of the Democratic caucuses and councils will continue to be held at the Colorado Convention Center.

The DNCC announced today that a special block of “Community” credentials will be reserved for Colorado residents for Thursday night’s program at INVESCO Field. Details about how to sign up and receive a “Community Credential” for the last night of the Convention will be released in the coming weeks.

That's going to seriously FUCK UP the construction crews building the new media city at the Pepsi Center.

Now... In addition to totally building out an entire media city in one arena, they have to build an entire SECOND media city in INVESCO Field.

Ah, the producers of this cluster-fuck are going absolutely APE-SHIT. I mean, 100%, out of their minds insane.

This cracks me up. I remember an event. The roof caved in -- Philly I think it was -- 48, 72 hours before the event. We had to relocate the damn thing to Madison Square Garden including the television uplinks, satellite feeds, which satellite we were relaying off, AND contact something like 3,000 people and tell them to get to New York. We had BUSES in Philly that afternoon hauling people to the City for those who didn't get the word. Talk about your major clusterfucks.

This... this Obama speaking at Mile High has all the makings of a world-class clusterfuck. Not for Obama. Obama will be GREAT. He eats this shit up. But everyone else will be going bug-fucking NUTS.

The good news? Group News Blog will be there with four reporters covering it LIVE. Ha!

I am SO HAPPY!!!

There's more...

“Alex”

This ad works.

It scares the hell out of McCain, Republicans, and traditional media.

Contributions to MoveOn.org PAC will help get this ad on the air.

There's more...

Breaking: NBC's Tim Russert Dead

Apparent Heart Attack Fells Russert at 58

Tim Russert died today.

Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — Tim Russert, host of NBC's "Meet the Press" and its Washington bureau chief collapsed and died at work Friday after suffering an apparent heart attack. He was 58 Russert, of Buffalo, N.Y., took the helm of the Sunday news show in December 1991 and turned it into the most widely watched program of its type in the nation. His signature trait there was an unrelenting style of questioning, sparing none of the politicians, business giants and even sports figures who appeared on his show.

Washington Post

Russert, 58, collapsed while recording voiceovers for his Sunday morning interview program, NBC reported. He was initially reported to have suffered a heart attack while working in his office on Washington's Nebraska Avenue, but the network said later only that he was "stricken at the bureau" and subsequently died. Further details were not immediately available.

Russert served as NBC's Washington bureau chief and the host of "Meet the Press," the top-rated Sunday talk show, which had an enormous influence on politics and was marked by his aggressive style of interrogation. As a frequent commentator on the "Today" show, "NBC Nightly News" and other shows, Russert wielded such clout that when he declared that Sen. Barack Obama had wrapped up the Democratic nomination last month, his pronouncement was treated as a news event in itself.

Russert's television career was marked by a voracious appetite for politics and a shrewd understanding of how politicians interact with the media. He also wrote a book about his father, titled "Big Russ and Me." Last week, he moved Big Russ to a nursing facility.

Former NBC News anchor Tom Brokaw gave MSNBC viewers the news of Russert's death at 3:40 p.m. (GNB Note: Video available at Washington Post.)

Brokaw said Russert had just returned from a family trip to Italy with his wife, writer Maureen Orth. They were celebrating the graduation of their son, Luke, from Boston College this spring, Brokaw said.

Russert served as host of "Meet the Press" longer than any other person and was "one of the premier political analysts and journalists of his time," Brokaw said. He began hosting "Meet the Press" in 1991.

Tributes to Russert began pouring in as news of his death circulated.

Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) said: "Tim was a warm and gracious family man with a great zest for life and an unsurpassed passion for his work. His rise from working-class roots to become a well-respected leader in political journalism is an inspiration to many. Tim asked the tough questions the right way and was the best in the business at keeping his interview subjects honest."

Russert was born May 7, 1950, in Buffalo, N.Y., the son of Irish American parents. His father was a World War II veteran who worked two blue-collar jobs while raising four children in a working-class neighborhood in South Buffalo. Raised as a staunch Roman Catholic, Russert attended Buffalo's Jesuit Canisius High School and went on to study law at Cleveland State University.

He got his start in New York Democratic politics, working on the political campaigns of Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Gov. Mario Cuomo. He served as chief of staff to Moynihan from 1977 to 1982 and was a counselor in Cuomo's Albany office from 1983 to 1984.

Russert was hired by NBC's Washington bureau in 1984 and became the network's Washington bureau chief four years later.

Tim Russert speaks to the crowd during the Democratic presidential debate
between Senator Clinton and Senator Obama in Cleveland on February 26, 2008.
photo Mark Duncan/AP.

I really like what Jane Hamsher says in her obit.

Firedoglake

Dave Winer said that "the Internet destabilizes every hierarchy it contacts." Russert stood as a symbol of an institutional journalistic hierarchy for many of us, and bloggers right and left railed against him mightily. He took arrows on behalf of many who practiced the journalism of his era, and stood his ground.

He is survived by his father, who is in his late 80s. Condolences to all his friends and family.

Well said.

In addition to his father, Russert is also survived by Maureen Orth (his wife), and a college-aged son.

Traditional journalists (broadcast and print) have not and can not and the vast majority of them will never successfully meet the opportunity (to them it's a threat; not even rising to the level of a challenge, let alone an opportunity) of the Internet.

They simply don't get it.

Russert was no exception.

The question I wonder about is, was Russert the way he was because he simply had too much invested in defending the media and traditions in which he was so successful, or was he the way he was because he was that way?

My guess -- with Russert (I'd say the opposite for O'Reilly) -- is the former. Which is one of the nicest assessments I have to say about Russert. It means he could have, might have, broken free.

If only.

Now we'll never know.

My condolences to his family.

Updated 8:10 PM.

Driftglass' obit. *smiles*

Sweet.

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“They say the neon lights are bright on Broadway”

“They say there's always magic in the air”
- On Broadway, George Benson

All That Jazz was nominated for nine Academy Awards in 1980; it won four. The late, wonderful Roy Scheider was among the nominated. George Benson's brilliant performance of On Broadway opened the 1979 movie as the dancers auditioned, leaping across stage.

Broadway.

Time Square in 1979 was the home of hookers and addicts. Some of the best live peep shows in New York City were between 7th and 8th Ave on W 42nd St. On the south side of the street, to be specific, not that I'd know. Certainly not in 1979 when I was still in the Army. I didn't move to New York till 1984.

Times Square. The peep shows are gone; the tourists are safe. The last time I was in New York -- it's been years -- I had to walk all the way over to 57th and Madison to find a hooker working the streets. In the mid-80s, you couldn't walk down 42nd St without being propositioned three, four times in a block. I liked it better then. (Not the hookers; the mood.)

Change.

Speaking of, what's behind those neon lights on One Times Square?

For starters, they're no longer neon. They're LCD's. Millions of 'em.

One Times Square is empty. No tenements. Why bother, when a single sign pulls in $300,000 a month? A veritable fortuna.

h/t Make and Gothamist.

There's more...

The Meaning of School Shootings: Part Four (and Last)

My apologies for the wait between parts Three and Four -- my personal life (GDC, finals, projects, etc.) got in the way, as did my desire to make sure that I adequately presented the arguments against my thesis (which meant I had to actually read a couple of books :-)). But we're here at last, and we'll finish off the argument and provide a suggestion for improving our situation.

Re-cap of Parts One, Two, and Three
School shootings are statistically insignificant as a cause of death and injury in America, but they garner an unjustifiably large share of our media when they happen. I contend that we are interested in them not only because "if it bleeds, it leads" on TV, but because we recognize them as aberrant phenomena and, as sense-making creatures, we want to know why they happen and what they mean.

We are addressing part of why they happen -- not the short and long-term triggering events (bullying, childhood abuse, mental illness, all mentioned multiply in comments) but the long-term enabling events which result in murders rather than brawls or other, less socially unacceptable, behaviour? Why shootings? How did we go from fistfights to "rumbles" with knives to guns?

Violent media imagery plays a significant part. Violent media imagery includes movies, TV shows, TV news, music, and video games (computer games, arcade games, and console games). Studies show clearly that consumption of violent media imagery correlates with later violent behavior and that there are at least two mechanisms at work: arousal (which reinforces violent behaviours observed and performed) and desensitization (which reduces barriers to violent behaviour). Statistical examination suggests that between 15% and 37% of the increased aggressive or violent behaviour can be explained by exposure to violent media imagery.

Arguments against violent media imagery promoting violent behaviour often actually support the idea: James Paul Gee promotes video games as very effective teaching tools and arousal is at the heart of his argument. Harold Schechter suggests that all popular media is demonized and that the US has always had extremely violent media in the form of broadsides, dime novels, public executions, and other "savage pastimes". But he acknowledges that children behave differently today consuming both passive and active violent media imagery and that the physical "roughhousing" that resulted from earlier media violence is now missing.

Enabling
In my opinion, the link between violent media imagery and violent behaviour (both by correlation and by method) is well established. Violent media imagery effects (we'll see shortly why "causes" is not the right term) violent behaviour in two ways: it reinforces (via arousal and lack of contextual negative feedback both in story and real life) and it desensitizes (via repetition and contextual positive feedback both in story and real life). Note the common element of contextual feedback, which is covered extensively in Grossman: soldiers kill within a sharply defined context which requires (among other things) approval by an authority figure. Violent media imagery generally fails at "properly" (by which I mean in accordance with either military training or a desire to limit societal violence) contextualizing violence. This is a substantial difference between Schechter's "savage pastimes" and modern media violence: public executions, for instance, were clearly contextualizing non-state violent behaviour as inappropriate and subject to state sanction; even 1950's media like Daniel Boone (cited by Schechter as extremely violent by today's media standards) show a black-and-white view of violence (good violence by state actors and heroes in retribution for bad violence by non-state actors and villains like "Indians") that has context which is missing in much of today's violent imagery.

Viewed in this light, violent media imagery doesn't cause violent behaviour; it enables violent behaviour. As many commenters have noted, other causes (mental illness, abuse, bullying, ...) lead to violent behaviour: what violent media imagery does is make the response to those causes more violent than it would be otherwise.

Training
One particularly frightening enabling factor is the use of video games (yes, here I am explicitly indicting video games as opposed to generalized violent media imagery) for training. The US military and law enforcement have used video games back to Duck Hunt to teach trainees in "shoot / don't shoot" choices (largely "shoot" for the military and "don't shoot" for law enforcement, but the techniques are very similar). As the military uses them, games of this sort can be considered conditioning tools. As the law enforcement community uses them, games like Hogan's Alley are some of the best shoot / don't-shoot training aids available, and are far cheaper than creating a real "Hogan's Alley" like the FBI's training facility.

There is another way these games work, however:

Fourteen-year-old Michael Carneal steals a gun from a neighbor's house, brings it to school, and fires eight shots into a student prayer meeting that is breaking up. Prior to stealing the gun, he had never shot a real handgun in his life. The FBI says that the average experienced law enforcement officer, in the average shoot-out, at an average range of seven yards, hits with approximately one bullet in five. So how many hits did Michael Carneal make? He fired eight shots; he got eight hits, on eight different kids. Five of them were head shots, and the other three were upper torso. The result was three dead and one paralyzed for life. I tell law enforcement officers about this when I train them, and they are stunned. Nowhere in the annals of law enforcement or military or criminal history can we find an equivalent achievement. And this from a boy on his first try. (Grossman & DeGaetano, Stop Teaching Our Kids to Kill, pg 4)

Video games are effective training devices. The US military wouldn't use them if they didn't work. Michael Carneal not only hit eight out of eight times on eight different targets, apparently all eight shots were into the "sniper's triangle" of upper chest and head. Impressive. Possibly unequaled. But still odd. Most inexperienced (and many experienced) shooters fix on a single target and fire until that target goes down, sometimes pulling the trigger continuously on an empty weapon.

The normal, almost universal response is to fire at a target until it drops and then move on to the next target. (ibid, pg 76)

There's only one school of shooting that teaches you to stand in one place and put one round into each target's head: video games.

Michael Carneal...never moved his feet during his rampage. He never fired far to the right or left, never far up or down....most video games each you to fire at each target only once, hitting as many targets as you can...And many video games give bonus effects ... for head shots. (ibid, pg 75-76)

Carneal is perhaps the most extreme example, but there are others. Wesley Schaefer in South Carolina, the Jonesboro, Arkansas shootings, and even Columbine have various links to video games ("obsessive" playing of video games, use as an explicit training tool, gaining tactical expertise, etc.). In none of these cases is the training link as explicit or as dramatic, and in none of them do video games cause the violence. But in all of them the training provided by video games enables the activity.

What's To Be Done?

Banning video games or violent media imagery is not on the table. Not only is it un-American, it probably wouldn't work. When you find a course of action which is both immoral and ineffective, it's best to look for other options.

Aside from attacking the actual causes of violent behaviour (mental illness, bullying, abuse, etc.), the best long-term solution is to properly contextualize violence, especially for young people. Soldiers returning from war do not have a significantly higher level of murderous behaviour than the population at large. Their training has enabled them to function in war without loosing warlike behaviour upon the rest of us, largely through dehumanization of the enemy and because of the strong requirement for authoritative orders before firing. These controlling elements are largely missing in most violent media imagery. In fact, much modern media glorifies the hero who breaks the rules in order to violently solve problems.

Consider the difference between Blade (the comic book, movies, TV series, and video games) and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. In Blade, the enemy is well defined and, in fact, inhuman (or serving the inhuman vampires). Killing a human in Blade: Trinity is clearly contextualized as a Bad Thing for a variety of reasons. Although GTA:SA is somewhat cartoonish in appearance, there's no dehumanization of enemies at all: they are fellow people, whether innocent civilians, enemy gang members, or even police officers. There is no clear distinction (in the game -- some players may provide one themselves) between civilians and combatants.

Let's be clear: the difference is not multiple forms of media versus video game. The difference is the contextualization of violence as acceptable against a limited class of enemy (one you're unlikely to encounter in real life, I might add) versus the contextualization of violence as acceptable against anyone. In 1950s and 1960s TV, violence was often properly contextualized (for the time: we need not discuss the inappropriateness of accepting violence against Indians or other class or racial grouping that was generally acceptable then) as acceptable when used against certain groups and unacceptable against other groups. We may lament the groups chosen then (or now) and we may consider this distinction irrelevant, but it is actually critical when you look back (see Part Two) at the five factors of Grossman's model for making killing acceptable to soldiers: Demands of Authority, Group Absolution, Predisposition of Killer, Total Distance from Victim, Target Attractiveness of Victim. Context figures prominently in Demands of Authority, Group Absolution, Total Distance from Victim, and Target Attractiveness of Victim.

Several parts of the 1954 Comics Code addressed this contextualization:

• Crimes shall never be presented in such a way as to create sympathy for the criminal, to promote distrust of the forces of law and justice, or to inspire others with a desire to imitate criminals.
• If crime is depicted it shall be as a sordid and unpleasant activity.
• Criminals shall not be presented so as to be rendered glamorous or to occupy a position which creates a desire for emulation.
• In every instance good shall triumph over evil and the criminal [be] punished for his misdeeds.
• Inclusion of stories dealing with evil shall be used or shall be published only where the intent is to illustrate a moral issue and in no case shall evil be presented alluringly, nor so as to injure the sensibilities of the reader.

The 1954 Comics Code isn't a model I'd like to emulate, but you find ideas where you find them. An informal code for media intended for children (under R, certainly) might be useful.

Unfortunately, "proper" contextualization is culture and nation dependent. Consider Counter-Strike:Condition Zero, in which players play either anti-terrorist units or terrorist cells. From an American cultural perspective, proper contextualization would limit players to playing anti-terrorist units. Other cultural contexts might find more propriety in playing the terrorist forces (although they would undoubtedly be relabeled "freedom fighters" or "Warriors for God" or something similar). Contextualization requires moral choices that many liberals in America are likely to be uncomfortable making. Of course, some conservatives may find contextualization just as difficult: is it OK to use violence against people violating the rule of law in America? Regardless of your position on the political spectrum, there are moral elements present in determining a "proper" context for violence, and there are some positions (ultimate pacifism, for instance) from whom there is no context where violence is acceptable.

Conclusion
Ultimately, school shootings are meaningful because they are aberrant. They focus our attention on changes in our society that normally remain hidden: the pervasiveness of bullying and abuse, the increase in violent media images, the effectiveness of video games as training devices. What we choose to do with that attention and the knowledge that comes from it is the hard question. The harder we look at the system the more complex it becomes, and the more complex it is the less likely simplistic solutions (ban video games, demonize Hollywood) are to work. Complex solutions (reduce abuse by reducing poverty and rebuilding the family, reduce bullying by diversity and education, recontextualize violence as inappropriate in more circumstances) are harder to conceive and immeasurably harder to implement, especially when public policy ideas must be sold in six-second sound bites.

Finding a solution begins with understanding the nature of the problem.


Sources:
James Paul Gee, Why Video Games are Good for your Soul, Common Ground, ISBN 186335574-X, 2005.
Dave Grossman and Gloria DeGaetano, Stop Teaching Our Kids to Kill, Crown, ISBN 0-609-60613-1, 1999.
Dave Grossman, On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society, Back Bay Books, ISBN 0-316-33011-6, 1995, 1996.
Harold Schechter, Savage Pastimes, St. Martin's Press, ISBN 0-312-28276-1, 2005.


A Personal Note: when I set out researching this topic, I was of the opinion that violent media imagery was generally irrelevant to violent behaviour. I had worked extensively in video games and been constantly assured that we provided catharsis not conditioning. I ignored facts like the military using video games as training tools (both tactical training and conditioning). I've read some of Grossman's fiction and did not like it. I've followed the stories about Jack Thompson and find him odious, opportunistic, and overly sensational. I started writing this series (originally going to be a single post) with the idea that I would show that school shootings and violence are statistically irrelevant and have no underlying "cause".

But upon reading the source material, my opinion changed as my understanding of the mechanisms deepened. Imagine my surprise when I wrote this series instead. I have read more than a thousand pages on this subject (and have one major work left to read -- it turned out to be unnecessary for this series), and it turned me around 180 degrees. I feel like someone smacked me upside the head with a big pile of bumper stickers saying "if you can't change your mind, how do you know you have one?".

Thanks for reading.

There's more...

The Meaning of School Shootings: Part Three

In parts One and Two we discussed the NIU shooting, the low rate of homicide in schools in America, possible demographic effects upon violent crime rates, studies of Arousal and Desensitization in consumers of violent media imagery, and I introduced you to Lt. Col. Dave Grossman and his psychological model of resistance to killing and how the military overcomes the innate resistance 98% of us have to killing other humans.

I want to re-iterate that I have generally been talking about violent media imagery (which can include video games, but is explicitly also movies, TV, TV news, and music as well as video games), not specifically about violent video games. There has been a lot of discussion in comments about banning video games, and that is not the main thrust of this article. Certain specific video games will eventually enter the story, but most of our discussion so far has been about generalized violent media imagery. This part talks explicitly about counter-arguments, many of which deal specifically with video games. I want to make clear that I am talking about video games in this post because of those counter-arguments, not because I want to specifically attack video games.

We have established that there are studies showing effective Arousal upon viewing violent imagery and that Desensitization occurs (that is, over time it takes more violent imagery to create an equal reaction in consumers). It's not surprising, therefore, that we find trends of increasing violence in media:

For one thing, there's more of it. Laval University professors Guy Paquette and Jacques de Guise studied six major Canadian television networks over a seven-year period, examining films, situation comedies, dramatic series, and children's programming (though not cartoons). The study found that between 1993 and 2001, incidents of physical violence increased by 378 per cent. TV shows in 2001 averaged 40 acts of violence per hour.
...

Paquette and de Guise also identified a disturbing increase in psychological violence, especially in the last two years. The study found that incidents of psychological violence remained relatively stable from 1993 to 1999, but increased 325 per cent from 1999 to 2001. Such incidents now occur more frequently than physical violence on both francophone and anglophone networks.

Canadians are also heavily influenced by American programming. Paquette and de Guise found that over 80 per cent of the TV violence aired in Canada originates in the U.S. ... Overall, 87.9 per cent of all violent acts appear before 9 p.m., and 39 per cent air before 8 p.m. -- at a time when children are likely to be watching.

I assume it's unnecessary to cite increasing realism and violence in video games :-).

From the studies and books I have read and cited in this series, I am well-convinced that violent media imagery increases the chances of aggressive and violent behaviour. It's not clear how much, but I find the arguments in favor of Arousal and Desensitization very compelling.

So let's take a look at the other side of the argument.

Counter-Arguments
While I was at GDC (the annual computer Game Developer's Conference) last month (part of the reason this piece is so late), I thought I'd see what the game developer's community had to say about this. So I went to the GDC store and bought the two books they had on the subject: James Paul Gee's Why Video Games Are Good For Your Soul and Harold Schechter's Savage Pastimes: A Cultural History of Violent Entertainment. I read them cover to cover and I believe I held an open mind about their content.

Why Video Games Are Good For Your Soul
Gee's book is a short paean to the teaching ability of video games, with specific examples (numbers added for easy reference below):

(1) A player's actions and decisions in Castlevania: Symphony of the Night creates a colorful and affect-laden world, a world which recruits the player's feelings, emotions, and interest in powerful ways....Unfortunately, this background of affect -- of feeling, emotion, caring, interest and excited expectation about what will come next -- is treated as entirely unimportant in school. Nonetheless, it is the background without which there is no real learning. (p. 31)

(2) Things are different in a game like Full Spectrum Warrior for the Xbox. This game teaches the player how to be, albeit not a professional vampire hunter, but a professional soldier. It demands that the player thinks, values, and acts like one to "win" the game... (p. 43)

(3) Games like Full Spectrum Warrior allow players to participate in expert knowledge, values, strategies, and skills. They allow players to experience a sense of control -- a partial (but only partial) control over fate and caprice -- in a complex and sometimes dangerous and threatening set of situations. Players experience a certain expert mastery of complexity, risk, and danger. Such a feeling -- often quite lacking in real life -- is exhilarating. (p. 49)

(4) It is important -- and this is something we know from recent research on the mind -- that seeing and action are deeply connected for human beings (Barsalou 1999a, b; Gelnberg 1997; Glenberg & Robertson 1999). (p. 54)

(5) But adding authentic professionalism to a game does not just open up a unique space for strategy, it also opens up a unique space for identity. An authentic professional has values and attitudes, as well as characteristic ways of talking, acting, and interacting, connected to his skill or special skills and knowledge. These values, attitudes and ways of talking, acting, and interacting constitute and identity. In blending with the virtual character -- in acting out of a shared set of skills -- the player takes on this identity. The player gets to play with, think about, and empathize with this identity in an embodied way, since the virtual character is the player's surrogate body in the game world. (p. 68)

(6) Take first- and third-person shooter games as an example, games often derided by politicians and policy makers, e.g., games like Half-Life, Metal Gear Solid, Deus Ex, System Shock 2, Max Payne, and Far Cry. Here are just a few (there are many more) of the learning principles that the player is (however tacitly) exposed to in learning the play these games:

• (6a) Learning is based upon situated practice, not lectures and words out of context;
• ...
• (6b) Learning is a form of extended engagement of self as an extension of an identity to which the player is committed;
• ...
• (6c) Problems are ordered so that the first ones to be solved in the game lead to fruitful generalizations about how to solve more complex problems later on;
• ...
• (6d) There are intrinsic rewards (within the game) keyed to any player's level of expertise
• ... (pp. 112-113)
  

It's tempting to just say "Gee says games are great teaching tools" and point out that such a statement would be supportive of the idea that violent media encourages violent behaviour, but I hate to pass up the opportunity to go point by point....

(1) When Gee talks about the effectiveness of affect as a teaching aid (indeed, the requirement that affect be present for learning, he's saying that Arousal is an effective teaching aid. So increased Arousal in consumers of violent media imagery means that learning is happening more easily while consuming violent imagery.

(2) Do we really need several million more Americans trained to think, value, and act like soldiers? And does the game include training and values based upon the Geneva Accords?

(3) Once again, "...is exhilarating" links us back to Arousal. The effective transfer of expert knowledge leads us to the point (below) of successful training.

(4) "...[S]eeing and action are deeply connected for human beings" reminds us that the interactivity of video games makes them even more effective teaching (and training) devices than other (more passive) media.

(5) Players "...empathize with this identity in an embodied way", implying greater connection between the player and their avatar/character.

(6)
(6a) Emphasizing the conditioning effect of shooters.

(6b) Again, emphasizing the connection between the player and avatar/character

(6c) Overgeneralization of game behaviour is exactly what those derisive "politicians and policy makers" are worried about.

(6d) Rewards are an effective conditioning teachnique.

In the end, Gee's arguments sum up to "computer games can be effective learning techniques". And as I already noted, that is an argument in support of the idea that violent media (and computer games in particular) can encourage Arousal and Desensitization (as shown by studies) and potentially transmit game behaviours to the real world. I have no argument with Gee's conclusions -- computer games can be powerful learning tools. The question is: what should we use them to teach?

Savage Pastimes
Most of Savage Pastimes can be summed up as "there used to be really ugly media before TV". Dime novels, murder ballads, and so on. This is immaterial. Our argument against violent media is that studies demonstrate certain effects. We do not claim that current media is uniquely violent, but that it is (as measured by studies) effective at reinforcing certain behaviours.

The remainder of Schechter's arguments against violent media encouraging violent behaviour are a claim that critics of pop media overstate the number of studies showing correlation between violent media and violent behaviours and generic claims that those studies that do exist are flawed. The first is irrelevant (I have made no claims about vast numbers of studies) and the second lacks enough detail to consider. I have found no specific claims that the studies I cite are flawed.

One quote is perhaps worth addressing:

There's no doubt that, for young boys, there's a connection between watching action-packed entertainment and roughhousing. That was certainly true of me and all the other nice, middle-class Bronx-born boomers I grew up with. After watching a few hours of Wild Bill Hickock or the Cisco Kid, we could hardly contain ourselves. We would strap on our leatherette holsters and leap into action, galloping around the house on invisible steeds, taking potshots at each other with our Hopalong Cassidy pistols, throwing ourselves at each toehr and wrestling like bear cubs. The cries of our mothers -- shouting at us (in those pre-PC days) to go play outside if we wanted to act like "wild Indians" -- still echoes in my ears.

Grossman (and others) explicitly argue that it is the lack of this physical release for the Arousal of violent media which contributes to the Desensitization and conditioning of consumers of violent media. Instead of using media imagery in constructive ways, the constant exposure without catharsis is a part of the problem.

If these two volumes represent the best arguments against the idea that violent media has negative effects upon at least some consumers, then the defenders of media have a problem.

I had thought that I'd finish with this part, but I think that's enough for now. I apologize for the long gap between postings and promise that I'll be quicker with Part Four, which should wrap things up. We've now covered all the essential bases except one: how specific arcade games act as enablers (training devices) for shooters and why the military uses even simple games to condition soldiers to fire. Once we know that, we see how the chain operates: from violent media through Arousal, Desensitization, and Conditioning, adding Training to enable some few individuals to perform quite incredible feats of combat shooting without ever having touched a firearm before. Finally, we'll talk about how the decontextualization of violent media imagery contributes to the problem, and how relatively small changes in the content of violent media presentations can make a difference.

There's more...

BACKGROUND: “Tucker” Cancelled or “Old Yellerbelly Put Out Of His Misery

That Tousled, Empty Head Rolls At Last...

God...90 days never seemed so long...

Our long, national nightmare that is the execrable, “nails-on-a-chalkboard-piped-through-a-speaker-punctured-P.A. system” “Tucker” show is nearing its end.

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Needless to say, the members of the MSNBC He-Man Woman Haters Club are NOT happy with seeing their little mascot Tucky about to be wished into the cornfield. The slimy Joe Scarborough is supposedly all pissy about it, and the pan-faced lout Chris Matthews is openly angry about it, as it indicates a further shift from his “Playboy Club—but no icky girllllz unless they're in bunny suits!” idea of a network.

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This should be fun to watch...in that fucked-up, “voted-off-the-island” reality-TV kind of way. I just wonder where Tucky's gonna land next? Dancin' on “Soul Train” and workin; the scramble board? Naaaaaah, they finally cancelled ST a couple of years ago. Somewhere on FOX? Sadly, he's so shitty I don't think even they would have him. That game show pilot? Yeah, but only if it's called “Let's Dunk The Jerk”, and Carlson sits over the tank.

The time just...seemed to drag by, like a lame, mange-eaten, feral dog in the heat. Ugh.

And in a final bit of mini-analysis, the Tucker Carlson death-watch gets a little more noticeable. I couldn't help but notice a definite shifting of things at MSNBC in the last ten days of the heavy primary coverage. If you watched you probably caught it too. On the primary nights, Rachel Maddow (who I still have a crush on, as does my stepson now) was featured as an in-studio guest on the panel discussions—NOT TUCKER. She sat there in the comfy, cozy studio with their big guns like Chris Cilizza and Howard Fineman and Pat Buchanan while Tucker was on the chilly-ass road as a stringer. On the night of the Iowa Caucus, he reported from New Hampshire, where nobody but three flinty old guys in Carharrt jackets were. It was the equivalent of a report on the Iditarod where an exciting, key stage just ended and you toss to the finish line for a report...where nobody fucking is. Maddow was in-studio, piquant and buffing her star as Tucky tried to unfreeze his smirk in the chill New England air. She easily topped him that night with an airtime ratio of 10-to-1.

Which is amazing as he's a network show host. Pretty damning.

In the days between Iowa and NH, they featured her even more on the big stage, showing up on all of the net's shows—save for his, and I couldn't help noticing in their promos for “Super Tuesday” coverage their usual wall of photos of correspondents featured Olbermann, Matthews, Mitchell, Shuster, O'Donnell, Scarborough, Lester Holt and even Dan Abrams...but no Tucky.

Come Tuesday night, there's Rachel again, resplendent in-studio and on for hours (including a zesty evisceration of Matthews) and on the road with a speech-stumbling John McCain was Tucker Carlson, effectively reduced to stringer status like the net's lesser lights Ron Mott, Ron Allen, Mike Taibbi and others who stand in the rain for on-scene “stand-ups”.


That's a serious bust-down in status—not to mention that his show was pre-empted on Tuesday for more pre-election coverage by...

...an in-studio Olberman.

They wouldn't even let him do his miserable little show from the Straight Talk Express's toilet, where I'm guessing he was ensconced crying his puffy little eyes out.

Suffer the smarmy, two-left-footed little children.

If you had any doubt about the network's knowing where the weakest link (as Matthews ain't exactly iron-tough himself and is weak himself numbers-wise) link in their chain is, let that doubt be confirmed with their rather brusque curb-kickage of Carlson—a supposed “Village” insider for now ubiquitous presence of the fresh-faced Maddow.

His “glove” ain't good enough to carry his anemic bat on the bench any longer. He knows it—and it showed in his lifeless performances in his limited appearance time.

The signs were all there. The Maddow pilot. The creeping quality-level anorexia of his show's guest gets, and most recently, a certain pity being taken by his fellow nut-clutching on-air buddies Chris Matthews and Joe Scarborough where they clumsily crammed him into “charity” slots on their shows and practically rubbed his belly with “Will you come on tomorrow?” coos of solidarity”.

MSNBC's little crew of pig-tail pullers is minus one in the host's chair as they haven't outright fired Tucky, but rather—busted him down to a permanent status as a campaign “stringer” as noted in my earlier post shown above. Going from the cushy, prestige position of holding a host's chair to watching the flapjack flips in every one-horse town on the trail is a brutal diss indeed, but my sources tell me that his friends fought for him to be extended some dignity and be spared an ugly, outright firing.

He'll supposedly finish out the week in-studio before having to drag out the dopp kit and travel-sized Mennen Speed Stick™ for the rigors of the road and then be “replaced” as it were by the affable (in comparison), but wooden David Gregory—the net's main White House correspondent in a temporary election season program/spot-holder entitled Race For The White House. It's part of a long-rumored re-shuffling of the net's schedule where Keith Olbermann now gets a moved-up 10 p.m. rerun of “Countdown” instead of the midnight repeat, and a 2 a.m. third run, further establishing him as MSNBC's clear “horse”.

Gregory is not their first choice for the 6 p.m. slot in lieu of Carlson. It's doubtful he'll move the numbers much, but he is a team player with choice “Hill” contacts and access to high-place guest “gets”. He's a fort-holder until the campaign season ends. It is apparent that worried network brass didn't want to go for the big move yet of plugging Rachel Maddow into that spot at so key a time in the campaign season, but she is on stand-by and plays much better than Carlson and Gregory to the desired demographic. She's been on the net every weekday night for the last month it seems as a guest of Olbermann's (a tough haul as her radio show ended at 8.p.m., giving her about seven minutes for the limo trek from Air America's studio cross and up-town to NBC's 30 Rock soundstages) or Dan Abrams, although said Olbermann ubiquitousness will be stalled a bit with the as-of-today extension of her radio program to the 9 p.m. hour—ironically enough, a by product of increased radio interest in her thanks to her piquant TV appearances.

The word is that the “boys club” (which Olbermann sits outside of) fought hard against Maddow's installation under the guise of a seasoned Hill and political vet getting the slot for now as the campaign season takes on added drama. Were it not for the “pimping” gaffe, the spot may have gone to the younger (and better demographic-ed) David Shuster, instead of the overworked and under-timed Gregory, but alas...

Maddow will still be a presence on the net with her post-election analysis and fun and snappy repartee with the likes of her counter-balance/foil Pat Buchanan, and should her stock continue to rise as it has, we may yet see her in a vehicle of her own—if not a daily, then a weekly turn. Stay tuned for details.

But...this is a day to mourn Tucker, who I have referred to before as TV punditry's Ted McGinley—a personality fated to send any show he's featured on to a cathode-ray tube littered grave. Actually, SCTV's Bill Needle character comes to mind when I think of poor, snakebit Tucky, as Needle's character's fatal flaw also was an inability to keep any show he hosted for more than an episode or two—every guise of a “Needle” program would hilariously end up cancelled, with Bill's shitty attitude as evidence of his foreknowledge of the end's inevitably coming.

Carlson too would “show his ass” in creepy ways when the rumors and leaks broke beyond 30 Rock's art deco facade. He famously lashed out when news of his ratings crappitude became beyond-insider chatter, snapping unprofessionally...

Tonight, as he was signing off, MSNBC's Tucker Carlson closed by saying, “That does it for us. Thank you for watching as always, we mean that sincerely to all eight of you. We'll be back Monday. Up next, 'Hardball' with Chris Matthews. Have a great weekend.”

A TVNewser tipster tells us “MSNBC management [is] infuriated” at Tucker's flippant sign-off.

...And followed that little bit of tantrum-throwing with his close-of-last-week, on-air strained peas and silver spoon-tossing when he got schooled on the differences between European and American journalism by the reporter who broke Obama adviser Samantha Power's “Monster” slam—The Scotsman's Gerry Peev (how apropos a name of a person to send him 'round the penultimate bend):

CARLSON: Right. What—she wanted it off the record. Typically, the arrangement is if someone you‘re interviewing wants a quote off the record, you give it to them off the record. Why didn‘t you do that?

PEEV: Are you really that acquiescent in the United States? In the United Kingdom, journalists believe that on or off the record is a principle that‘s decided ahead of the interview. If a figure in public life.

CARLSON: Right.

PEEV: .someone who‘s ostensibly going to be an advisor to the man who could be the most powerful politician in the world, if she makes a comment and decides it‘s a bit too controversial and wants to withdraw it immediately after, unfortunately if the interview is on the record, it has to go ahead.

CARLSON: Right. Well, it‘s a little.

PEEV: I didn‘t set out in any way, shape.

CARLSON: Right. But I mean, since journalistic standards in Great Britain are so much dramatically lower than they are, here it‘s a little much being lectured on journalistic ethics by a reporter from the “Scotsman,” but I wonder if you could just explain what you think the effect is on the relationship between the press and the powerful. People don‘t talk to you when you go out of your way to hurt them as you did in this piece.
Don‘t you think that hurts the rest of us in our effort to get to the truth from the principles in these campaigns?

PEEV: If this is the first time that candid remarks have been published about what one campaign team thinks of the other candidate, then I would argue that your journalists aren‘t doing a very good job of getting to the truth.

The smarmy, ironic video of his lame little contretemps is here at Raw Story. Give it a watch to absorb the undiluted, full-strength assholery, if you dare.

It's a sad little denouement. An attempt it seems to go out in a blaze of glory like some sort of post-modern Howard Beale...

...when in actuality, it played out with all the gumption and brass balls of a dithering Ally McBeal.

Voted off again. Tsk-tsk-tsk. Not only is Jon Stewart funny, but it turns out that he's also a hell of a judge of character.

There's more...

“We Are The Ones” Song

Wonderful.