Extended Essay 2 - First Draft

Charlotte Lakin

Writ 1122

Professor Leake

03/03/2013

An International Approach to the Sandy Hook Shooting

            News can be local, national, or international but how does this affect the way the story is reported. If something happened in a small town in Indiana you would expect the local news to report it but would a national newspaper or even an international one. If that event in the small town was incredibly tragic it is more likely that the story will reach national and international news sources. We would expect the different news stories to report the same facts but in a different manner but how different are the stories portrayed. For example, a conservative newspaper will report political information very differently to an international newspaper that is neither conservative nor liberal. How do stories change as they go from country to country? How did the story of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting change as it went from local to national to international news?

On December 14^th, 2012, Sandy Hook elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut unfortunately became another victim of school shootings. Adam Lanza, before shooting himself, killed 20 children, 7 teachers, and his mother. He shot his way through the school’s security system and proceeded to two classrooms shooting anyone who tried to stop him. Children either hid in closets or locked classrooms or were escorted out of the school by teachers or law enforcement officers. He used his mother’s rifle to shoot the victims and her handgun to shoot himself. Lanza was unfortunately very accurate with his shooting as all but two of the victims were pronounced dead at the scene; the other two victims were taken to the hospital where they were pronounced dead. This shooting was reported as the second deadliest school shooting after the shooting at Virginia Tech, which had 32 victims. Within the next three days newspapers all over the world had published stories about this tragic event.

The full story had only just started to surface within the three days but the local newspaper, The Newtown Bee, was already reporting an early report of the incident online on the day of the shooting. The writers of this story are from Newtown and thus would have been more greatly affected than other reporters. These deeper feelings are displayed in the article, Details and Names Slow to Emerge in Wake of School Shooting, by the use of words and phrases such as “disbelief”, “shattered with grief”, “tragic”, “grave injuries”, and “horrified”. The preliminary article is short because not many facts had been given but it shows the multitude of the law enforcement involvement and quoted the state police lieutenant reassuring that “many agencies are working together to keep you informed”(The Newtown Bee). Because The Newtown Bee is a local newspaper they added at the end of their article that a lot of the churches were opening for counselling services and that a specific church was holding a mass that night.

Though The New York Times probably won’t talk about the churches being open for counselling services the author will still add a lot of emotion to the article because this happened in their own country. Of course the article, Nation Reels After Gunman Massacres 20 Children at School in Connecticut by James Barron, will have the plain and boring facts but it will also include similar emotions to The Newtown Bee article. This article was published the same day as the shooting but goes more in depth about what happened than the local story. The New York Times article gives more detail about how Lanza got into the school and what guns he used. Also, Barron gives some insight into Lanza by quoting a law enforcement officer: “Mr. Lanza had grown up in Newtown, and he was remembered by high school classmates as smart, introverted and nervous. They said he had gone out of his way not to attract attention when he was younger”(Barron). Barron has a similar word choice to the local article to make the situation that much more real and tragic: “terrified parents”, “sobbing children”, “frightened faces of children”, and “grim faces of women”. Barron also chooses his words wisely to describe Lanza. He chooses phrases such as “brutal efficiency”, “chillingly accurate”, “evil visited this community today”, and “slaughtered the children” in order to make Lanza seem more inhumane and evil.

When we cross the Atlantic Ocean to England, the story becomes a lot less emotional and a lot more factual. The Telegraph, an English newspaper, published a story, written by Nick Allen, hours after the incident. This article is much more fact based and does not use incredibly descriptive to give the readers a certain emotional reaction. When describing what Lanza did, Allen just presented the facts but also added, unlike The New York Times, that his brother claimed that Lanza had a personality disorder. Allen quotes ABC News for some of the facts presented but also quotes some of the witnesses and President Obama.  The New York Times quotes Obama as well but also quotes some other officials, where as The Telegraph quotes a parent, a student, an unnamed witness, and another parent. Nick Allen recognizes that it is a tragic event but being so geographically far away from the event the story is slightly more removed from the emotional side of the story.

Even more removed from the situation is a story reported by the Kuwait News Agency (KUNA). They published a very short story stating what happened with few details. The described the event in a few sentences. They gave details about his past such as when he moved to Newtown, when his parents got divorced, and that “[he] reportedly enjoyed soccer, skateboarding, and video games, and had no known criminal record”(KUNA). They reported that it was the second deadliest school shooting and gave examples of the deadliest school shooting and another school shooting in Colorado. This story has little to no emotion associated with it and just states the facts of what happened.

As the stories are reported further and further away from the U.S. they become less emotional and more fact-based. The U.K. is very connected to the U.S. so The Telegraph thoroughly reported the event with lots of detail but not as much emotion. The New York Times was just as emotional as the local newspaper. On the other hand, the story reported in Kuwait was completely devoid of emotions and only presented some of the facts.

 

 

 

Works Cited

Allen, Nick. "Connecticut School Shooting: Massacre at Sandy Hook Leaves 20 Children Dead."

The Telegraph. Telegraph Media Group, 14 Dec. 2012. Web. 5 Mar. 2013. <http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/9746051/Connecticut-school-shooting-massacre-at-Sandy-Hook-leaves-20-children-dead.html>.

Barron, James T. "Nation Reels After Gunman Massacres 20 Children at School in Connecticut."

The New York Times. The New York Times Company, 14 Dec. 2012. Web. 5 Mar. 2013. <www.nytimes.com/2012/12/15/nyregion/shooting-reported-at-connecticut-elementary-school.html?pagewanted=all>.

"Details And Names Slow To Emerge In Wake Of School Shootings." Newtownbee.com. The

Newtown Bee, 14 Dec. 2012. Web. 5 Mar. 2013. <newtownbee.com/news/news/0001/11/30/details-and-names-slow-emerge-wake-school-shooting/4584>.

"Gunman in US School Massacre Wore Battle Fatigues, Military Vest." Kuwait News Agency.

Integrated Digital Systems, 15 Dec. 2012. Web. 5 Mar. 2013. <http://0-www.lexisnexis.com.bianca.penlib.du.edu/lnacui2api/results/docview/docview.do?docLinkInd=true&risb=21_T16834499900&format=GNBFI&sort=BOOLEAN&startDocNo=1&resultsUrlKey=29_T16834496549&cisb=22_T16834499944&treeMax=true&treeWidth=0&selRCNodeID=48&nodeStateId=101en_US,1&docsInCategory=2&csi=356951&docNo=1>.