'A media own goal': Washington Post page on mass shootings shows how rare they are

In Sunday’s Washington Post, the paper printed the name of every mass shooting victim since 1966: 54 years, 165 mass shootings with 1196 victims:

A stunning page in today's Post print edition: the name of every mass shooting victim since 1966. pic.twitter.com/M8wMLJIh1J

— Mark W. Smith ??‍♂️ (@markdubya) August 11, 2019

Um, this does not show readers what they think it shows readers:

If you want to stoke outrage about this issue it's probably better not to highlight the fact that only 22 people a year are killed in mass shootings in a country of 300M+. A media own goal. https://t.co/vJmFq2cbsL

— Noah Pollak (@NoahPollak) August 11, 2019

Everything must be politicized though:

The WaPost unintentionally puts recent shootings in perspective. This is a very rare event and marginal cause of deaths—even deaths by murder. But if we keep politicizing these events to accomplish our policy objectives, we just might manage to make them more common. https://t.co/XSeCs8vwFu

— Randy Barnett (@RandyEBarnett) August 11, 2019

Now do people hit by lightning:

This is virulent innumeracy: trying to make a comparatively rare event look much bigger than it is by the way you print it out.

Figure out how many of these pages it would take to print the names of everybody struck by lightning since 1966. https://t.co/d39heZHW0a

— Robert Tracinski (@Tracinski) August 12, 2019

Or AIDS:

Honestly, this feels like it actually downplays the issue. Less than 2,000 in a half century is nearly nothing when compared to, say, the AIDS epidemic (700K since beginning) or opioid overdoses (nearly 50K in 2017 alone). https://t.co/LXpABMPtyg

— Emily Zanotti (@emzanotti) August 11, 2019

I don't think it downplays mass shootings to point out that a little over 1,200 deaths in 54 years is not exactly the terrifying plague that this implies it is. For perspective, 60 times more people died from opioid overdoses in 2017 alone. https://t.co/aMndB8lMNj

— neontaster (@neontaster) August 11, 2019

And remember when libs argued 10,000-12,000 partial-birth abortions a year was rare?

The trend on mass shootings is a serious issue, but I’m not sure that this is a good way to frame it.

For context: Many on the left argue that late-term abortions are very rare and therefore not a big issue, but there are 10,000-12,000 such abortions every year. https://t.co/FnO8kPp0st

— (((AG))) (@AG_Conservative) August 11, 2019

More comparisons…

Traffic deaths:

It is August 11th. About as many people have died in traffic accidents already in August as have died in mass shootings in the last 53 years. https://t.co/tHVwd918Ek

— Boomieleaks (@notwokieleaks) August 11, 2019

And let’s not forget gun violence in Chicago:

Shooting implies an instance where shots were fired, mass implies a greater than one amount of people

Some standards require people to have been killed to be a "mass shooting" some don't

In terms of more than four people shot, Chicago has had 26 'mass shootings' this year alone https://t.co/WFB2ooN8be

— Tim Pool (@Timcast) August 11, 2019

Put those names in the paper:

So far, 1636 people have been shot in Chicago this year. How many of those names have appeared in the Post? If they don't help the liberal agenda they don't exist. https://t.co/NUIrCkdla9 https://t.co/eS9CEWu4Ne

— Derek Hunter (@derekahunter) August 11, 2019

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