IMHO Blood and scandal is just what sells.

Examples you have seen include...?

The media sensationalizes these stories to keep you watching.

It's also a distraction away from the shit show circus of the perverted criminal elite.

It's amazing how much less fear I feel after getting rid of TV.

yeah, if i go literally one day without checking the internet or tv I feel fucking amazing, at one with the universe

It's counterproductive. I'm inspired.

It's also a psyop designed to make the sheeple think that the "lone gunmen myth" is somehow rooted in truth.

MSNBC always does a weekend shtick about being locked up in prison. Found it bizarre. Maybe a seed to place in the sheeples brain. This could be your future. Bwahahaha.

Fox news has been doing this for YEARS. This is nothing new. They tend to slap a couple of extra descriptors on there, just to scare their viewers (such as immigrant or person of color).

if it bleeds, it leads

I think it's more likely an excuse to justify further militarization of the police and overall gov't spending on 'security'. Overall, crime is down across most Western nations - so how are the big weapons manufacturers going to make money? They aren't, not unless they get their friends in the media to push the fear of a 'lone wolf' attack on the masses, who will then vote for anyone promising to be 'tough on crime' and increasing spending for firearms and so on.

Looking at everything that's on the news as some sort of sales pitch of some sort really answers a lot of questions, I find...

Or, it's because they know they can get a ton if views and clicks (read: money) by publicizing these stories. If it bleeds, it leads.

Nah, it's nothing new. The press were doing this in the '60s and earlier. Remember Manson, Gacey, Daumer, etc.? Jack the Ripper sold quite a lot of papers in the 19th century. Go back as far as you like in human history and you will find lurid tales meant to tittilate, horrify, and sell...

The object is, as it always was, is to get us to accept a crude and distorted image of ourselves and human beings in general as hateful, violent, and untrustworthy creatures, rather than the more obvious fact that that ones who do such sick and reprehensible things are nothing at all like the rest of us but rather mentally and psychologically damaged or deranged individuals.

And of course all the law requires is the ability to distinguish between right and wrong as a test of their sanity even if to all other appearances and with the insanity of their crimes those individuals are actually crazier than a bedbug.

It's all done to stoke and provoke our collective sense of anger, outrage, and hostility. So we don't look too closely at any of these individuals and only want to punish or execute them, not have some sense of guilt ourselves over the fact that they clearly weren't rational or in control of their actions.