Random Violence: How We Talk about New Crimes and New Victims

In this book, Best presents new ways to speak about and classify crimes through an analysis of what the public and the media classify as 'random violence'. Employing a number of research methods, Best's review of recent press coverage of crime provides evidence for people's growing concern with random violence and he draws attention to social policies that have been created to combat such violence and regulate its existence. This book is recommended for students either in media studies or criminology in order to lend insight into the critical role media plays in shaping our perceptions of crime, fear of crime, and perceived crime trends. Future editions, however, could focus on television news media more so than print media to reflect changing preferences in information gathering. Also, instances of entertainment media would end great insight to the argument. Reviewed by: MEGAN MCLEAN

Colin Flaherty received numerous accolades for his work in mainstream journalism, and now conducts a weekly radio program with his brother in which they view politics from a left-right divide. In addition, Colin just wrote a book that is not about its seeming topic. From first glance, this book would appear to be about race riots, and while it documents them well, the real purpose of this book is to ask Americans what’s wrong with us. Why can’t we talk honestly about this situation, why can’t we talk honestly about race, and why does our media avoid mention of necessary facts? Flaherty works his magic by creating a fact pattern out of many disparate news articles, which he then compares to YouTube footage of the event, showing us what actually happened. As this is an e-book, you can follow the links yourself, which is what this book challenges you to do. He does not ever stray into racism — at all. He does not blame African-Americans, or anyone else, for this spate of black on women, homosexuals, Asians and whites. He simply points out that it is occurring and that it upsets all Americans and weakens our faith in our media, who are brushing it under the rug. Writing in clear and sometimes sarcastic prose, Flaherty speaks from his strength, which is understanding media. He links together abundant citations, all from mainstream media and many from African-American media, in order to illustrate his point.