Luigi Mangione, the 26-year-old who allegedly shot and killed United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson, has been the subject of an avalanche of media coverage as people try to understand what drove him to commit such a violent crime. It’s attracting a lot of attention.
Since Mr. Mangione’s arrest, news reports have attempted to piece together Mr. Mangione’s alleged motive, suggesting that his back injury and resulting inability to have sex may have fueled his resentment toward the medical industry. Some do. Other reports portray Mangione as a recluse who rejects his wealthy upbringing and openly speculates about the “mysterious journey” of his “star student.”
On social media, Mangione has been met with sympathy and, in some cases, praise for his alleged role in the murders. Meanwhile, a fundraiser for Mangione’s defense has raised nearly $150,000. Dr. Joseph Richardson, professor of African American studies, medical anthropology and epidemiology at the University of Maryland, said many have made Mangione a “martyr.” But, he added, “it’s clear that if[Mangione]had been a young black man, the story would have been different.”
Overwhelming media coverage reinforces the idea that only certain people commit crimes
Pamela Mejia, Research Director, Berkeley Media Research Group
Mr. Mangione’s sweeping coverage has been interpreted as a result of Mr. Thompson’s status as a health care industry executive in a country where many people are frustrated by rising medical costs and lack of insurance coverage. But accepting that explanation itself reflects a racist double standard. In Richardson’s view, sympathetic media coverage is a sign of “white male privilege.”
Studies have shown that white men, the perpetrators of gun violence, especially high-profile incidents such as mass shootings, are often portrayed more sympathetically by news outlets. One study found that publications routinely speculated on the mental health of white perpetrators as a possible explanation for their actions and painted a mixed picture of their motivations, while those of people of color suspects have been reduced to racial stereotypes.
The mental health struggles of white perpetrators are always considered with great empathy. For example, Adam Lanza, who shot and killed six adults and 20 children at Sandy Hook School in Connecticut in 2012, was blamed on an oversight by mental health professionals and was blamed in multiple media outlets for being the victim of bullying. It was reported. Jared Loughner, who killed 19 people in a mass shooting in Tuscon, Arizona, in 2011, has been described as “troubled” in news reports, including profiles tracing his background. And in the 1999 Columbine school shooting that left 15 people dead, some news outlets perpetuated the myth that the shooter had been bullied and wondered what resources could have been provided to prevent the shooting. I guessed that.
Local media coverage also gives a sympathetic portrait of the white perpetrators. In 2014, Utah police officer Joshua Bolen shot and killed his wife, two children, mother-in-law, and himself after she accused Bolen of raping her. Bolen’s therapist later told police that Bolen repeatedly drugged his wife and videotaped himself sexually assaulting her. Despite his history of domestic violence, news reports described Bolen as a “teddy bear.”
Scott Duxbury, an assistant professor of sociology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, said of the Bolen shooting, “When reports about the shooter himself appeared in the media, what was often talked about was his own personal background.” speak “Many of his colleagues, friends and family loved being around him. How unexpected, considering he was a man with a history of actually abusing his wife. Sho.”
Duxbury said that in Mangione’s case, the “investigation” into his alleged motive for shooting Thompson was based on “assumptions of plausibility” and the question of who could commit a crime (racially biased). It is said that it is based on the concept of
“In the case of a black or brown shooter, the search for meaning is less intensive because there are deeply culturally ingrained stereotypes about black male criminal behavior that people just kind of believe in to begin with.” “It’s never done,” Duxbury said. “(Mangione) fits into the tier of other cases of high-profile media coverage of shooters. That type of person elicits a search for meaning that Americans typically associate with the typical suspect. It’s not the kind of look you’d expect from someone.”
Back in April, reports about Terry Clark Hughes Jr., a black man accused of killing four police officers during an attempted arrest in Charlotte, North Carolina, cited his criminal record and THC later found in his bloodstream. The focus was on what was done. (Hughes was shot and killed by police during the incident.)
In 2021, Jason Nightengale, also a black man, went on a rampage in the Chicago area, randomly shooting five people, before being shot and killed by police. Subsequent news coverage of Nightengale highlighted his arrest record and the “threatening” videos he posted on Facebook.
And in 2015, David Ray Conley, a black man who shot and killed eight family members, including two children, did not elicit a sympathetic portrait or explanation of his crime, despite similarities to the Boren murders. Duxbury and other researchers’ study of media reports instead found that the reports included Conley’s history of domestic violence and past cocaine possession. (Conley was sentenced to life in prison in 2021 for murder.)
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Duxbury said that in the 1920s, crimes committed by black people were often used to “legitimize a narrative of biological inferiority” or to advance the argument that blacks were “morally less developed than whites.” It is said that it was being used.
“If you look back at how mass shootings are (portrayed) today, the claims about racial differences are less obvious, but instead what is often made is that the white perpetrator was motivated by the black perpetrator. ”, he said.
“When white people commit acts of violence, the motives are often looked for. When you compare this to mass shootings committed by people of color, those motives are often less than sympathetic. Health doesn’t get as much attention.”
According to Pamela Mejia, director of research and associate program director at Berkeley Media, research shows that crimes committed by black and brown people are featured prominently in news stories, while white people are portrayed as the ones “working on crime.” It has been shown that there is a high possibility that research group. “Overwhelming media coverage reinforces the idea that only certain people commit crimes, making it seem like it’s more of an outlier when someone posing as a wealthy white person commits a crime. ” she says. “Because, again, the very stories that the media tells us about ourselves don’t make that the norm.”
Richardson said the reports of Mangione and other white men who committed violent acts ultimately reaffirm who society thinks is likely to commit crimes, and that white people are less likely to commit crimes. He said it would strengthen assumptions within the United States.
“When you have a white person, there’s always a case where you try to hold them to an explanation of why this person committed a crime,” Richardson said. “We don’t criminalize or place this person in the context of a predator or superpredator. There will definitely be a definitive explanation as to why this happened.”
