The “Don’t Inspire Evil” Initiative
Bloomfield Press, in cooperation with a growing list of nationally recognized institutions and individuals, joins in support of The Don’t Inspire Evil Initiative:
“Refrain from gratuitous or repetitious portrayal of mass murderers’ names and images.”
Accuracy In Media, Don Irvine, President
Lori Klein, President, Western Journalism Center
Sheriff Richard Mack, Founder, Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Assn.
Grover Norquist, President, Americans for Tax Reform
Bloomfield Press, Alan Korwin, Publisher and CEO
Crime Prevention Research Center, John Lott, President
David Kopel, Columnist, The Washington Post
Second Amendment Foundation, Alan Gottlieb, President
Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership, Rabbi Dovid Bendory
We join with Le Monde, La Croix, and CNN French TV affiliate BFMTV who will no longer publish photographs and names of terrorists “to avoid possible posthumous glorification effects.”
We stand with Douglas County Sheriff John Hanlin who became world news by refusing to name the perp in an Oregon college incident given saturation “coverage” in national media.
We support the work of No Notoriety, a citizen effort to curtail glorification heaped upon the worst elements of society in perverse efforts to increase media revenue.
We join with former highly regarded FBI Director James Comey who refused to name the mass murderer in Orlando to avoid the “twisted notion” that “fame or glory” could come from carrying out the attack.
The well-established link between copycat crimes, and excessive exposure of criminal perpetrators by mass media, must finally be admitted and broken. We support adoption of the ethical guideline above to encourage responsible reporting, and discourage behavior by reporters, broadcasters and editors that tends to glorify, promote or encourage mass murderers, jihadis and related criminal activity. Every journalist who fails to take steps to limit the publicity support these heinous villains seek is tantamount to complicity in the crimes they commit against humanity.
“We must starve terrorists of the oxygen of publicity which they seek.” --Margaret Thatcher
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