[Rebel Pirate]

“So since this story makes the point that the best thing to stop a bad person with a gun is a good person with a gun, the media is treating it like it never happened.” Figmo Bohica

“I found it reported in national news sources.” Taltarzac725

Yes, it was reported in the national press. But most significantly, the Newtown shooting received almost continuous coverage in print, broadcast, and online media, while the San Antonio shooting was reported sporadically in the press. I personally had no knowledge of the San Antonio shooting until reading this post.

“I certainly don't think it was part of a huge conspiracy to suppress news of this sort.” Graciegirl

Agreed – I don’t think there’s a conspiracy of news organizations to suppress news.

However, I do believe that one’s world view influences what one thinks is news worthy. Almost all the news coverage of the Newtown tragedy includes an implication that new federal legislation restricting gun ownership (i.e., better gun control) is the universal antidote to mass shootings/killings. And since the San Antonio news story supports a different narrative (the best thing to stop a bad person with a gun is a good person with a gun) most media deem it not news worthy...at least in terms of volume and amplitude of the coverage.

What about mentally ill people being one of the principal causes of mass killings where guns are simply their weapon of choice? Think back to many of the most recent, news-worthy shootings; many of these shootings were the work of mentally-ill individuals.

Do you remember several decades back when mentally ill people were routinely institutionalized? What happened? Well, society has undergone a long-term change called deinstitutionalization. The following passage between the **** is from Wikipedia.
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Deinstitutionalization is the process of replacing long-stay psychiatric hospitals with less isolated community mental health services for those diagnosed with a mental disorder or developmental disability.

Deinstitutionalization works in two ways: the first focuses on reducing the population size of mental institutions by releasing patients, shortening stays, and reducing both admissions and readmission rates; the second focuses on reforming mental hospitals' institutional processes so as to reduce or eliminate reinforcement of dependency, hopelessness, learned helplessness, and other maladaptive behaviors.

According to psychiatrist Leon Eisenberg, deinstitutionalization has been an overall benefit for most psychiatric patients, though many have been left homeless and without care. The deinstitutionalization movement was initiated by three factors:
• A socio-political movement for community mental health services and open hospitals;
• The advent of psychotropic drugs able to manage psychotic episodes;
• A financial imperative to shift costs from state to federal budgets.

According to American psychiatrist Loren Mosher, most deinstitutionalization in the USA took place after 1972, as a result of the availability of SSI, long after the antipsychotic drugs were used universally in state hospitals.

According to psychiatrist and author Thomas Szasz, deinstitutionalization is the policy and practice of transferring homeless, involuntarily hospitalized mental patients from state mental hospitals into many different kinds of de facto psychiatric institutions funded largely by the federal government. These federally subsidized institutions began in the United States and were quickly adopted by most Western governments. The plan was set in motion by the Community Mental Health Act as a part of John F. Kennedy's legislation and passed by the U.S. Congress in 1963, mandating the appointment of a commission to make recommendations for "combating mental illness in the United States".

In many cases the deinstitutionalization of the mentally ill in the Western world from the 1960s onward has translated into policies of "community release". Individuals who previously would have been in mental institutions are no longer continuously supervised by health care workers. Some experts, such as E. Fuller Torrey, have considered deinstitutionalization to be a failure, while some consider many aspects of institutionalization to have been worse.
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Another world view is to judge everything using the “black or white” model, i.e., it’s good or bad. The alternative world view is to recognize that everything (every product, every decision, every political system, and every (fill in the blank)) has both pros and cons.

Deinstitutionalization is good for the freedom of individuals. (PRO)
Deinstitutionalization is bad for the prevention of gun violence by mentally ill people who stop taking their psychotropic medications. (CON)

Gun ownership is good for the freedom of individuals. (PRO)
Gun ownership is bad for the prevention of gun violence by mentally ill people who stop taking their psychotropic medications. (CON)

SO, is deinstitutionalization or gun ownership the cause of gun violence? Or is it possible that both deinstitutionalization and gun ownership are both factors in mass shootings? Is it possible that neither is THE cause of gun violence?

Is it possible that over-simplification (gun ownership is the cause of gun violence) is not helpful to understanding and solving a complex social issue?...but that it DOES support an agenda promoted by many national leaders and media organizations?

Is it possible that the nature of the media (commercial success of for-profit news organizations is driven by the need for catchy headlines and appeal to a mass-audience) contributes to the over-simplification of complex issues?