TruthOut10
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- Dec 3, 2012
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How To Convince The NRA That Assault Weapons, Not The Media, Are Responsible For Gun Massacres
Stephen King best selling author of the very kind of violent books that gun advocates say contribute to gun violence has penned Guns, a 25-page essay dismissing their criticism, while calling for universal background checks for gun purchases, and a ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines.
A self-described blue-state American who also owns guns, King is no stranger to how individuals can and do turn to art as inspiration for violence. During the 1990s, no fewer than four shooters read Rage an early work King wrote in high school years and published under the pseudonym Richard Bachman years later entered their high schools with guns, held students and teachers hostage, and in some cases killed them. The book chronicles how Charlie Decker, a troubled high school student with a domineering father, brought a gun to school, killed his algebra teacher, and held his class hostage only to see his classmates experience a psychological inversion and come to his defense.
After copies of Rage were discovered in the possession of multiple high school shooters, King voluntarily pulled the book from publication. He did so not because the thin tome inspired would-be killers to commit unspeakable carnage; rather it acted as a possible accelerant for boys who spent time in psych wards pondering suicide or endured the kind of bullying that results in severe medical paranoia. These boys found a soul brother in Decker. He gave them blueprints to express their hate and rage and for that, King decided, he had to go. You dont leave a can of gasoline where a boy with firebug tendencies can lay hands on it, the author writes in Guns.
How To Convince The NRA That Assault Weapons, Not The Media, Are Responsible For Gun Massacres | ThinkProgress
Stephen King best selling author of the very kind of violent books that gun advocates say contribute to gun violence has penned Guns, a 25-page essay dismissing their criticism, while calling for universal background checks for gun purchases, and a ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines.
A self-described blue-state American who also owns guns, King is no stranger to how individuals can and do turn to art as inspiration for violence. During the 1990s, no fewer than four shooters read Rage an early work King wrote in high school years and published under the pseudonym Richard Bachman years later entered their high schools with guns, held students and teachers hostage, and in some cases killed them. The book chronicles how Charlie Decker, a troubled high school student with a domineering father, brought a gun to school, killed his algebra teacher, and held his class hostage only to see his classmates experience a psychological inversion and come to his defense.
After copies of Rage were discovered in the possession of multiple high school shooters, King voluntarily pulled the book from publication. He did so not because the thin tome inspired would-be killers to commit unspeakable carnage; rather it acted as a possible accelerant for boys who spent time in psych wards pondering suicide or endured the kind of bullying that results in severe medical paranoia. These boys found a soul brother in Decker. He gave them blueprints to express their hate and rage and for that, King decided, he had to go. You dont leave a can of gasoline where a boy with firebug tendencies can lay hands on it, the author writes in Guns.
How To Convince The NRA That Assault Weapons, Not The Media, Are Responsible For Gun Massacres | ThinkProgress
