Unencumbered by the thought process

Politics is in some respect a debating society. Of course money and other sources of power and privilege affect what voices get amplified, and tribal loyalties can trump facts and logic in how they are heard. Still, those of us who are rational empiricists can make an effort to judge the quality of arguments. Rep. Diane Black of Tennessee says that pornography is the cause of school shootings.

There is no evidence that I know of, and certainly none adduced by Rep Black, that any school shooter in history has even been exposed to pornography, let alone that it has anything to do with their actions. Of course they likely have, depending on your definition. When I was an adolescent my classmates got their hands on Playboy Magazine and so on. Nowadays, anybody with a telephone can see any kind of porn they want, so sure, these kids might have checked it out. Funny thing though, there's porno in Canada, Sweden, the UK, France -- oh, actually, just about everywhere that there have not so far been 23 school shootings this year, or in fact any at all. Also, the shooters aren't acting out soulless sexual fantasies, they're, you know, shooting people, which is not generally a feature in pornography.

School shootings, and mass shootings in general, are a small proportion of all gun violence. The linked piece in the Puffington Host says that "poor social, economic and cultural conditions are primary drivers of gun violence." That statement is too vague to be fact checked, but at least it isn't ridiculous. We really need to have honest discussion of our problems. Black is spouting nonsense based on her presumption that her voters don't like porno, so they'll be open to hearing it blamed for something else they don't like. (I won't bother to tell her that statistics show there is more on-line viewing of pornography in socially conservative parts of the country.) That isn't how logic works.