Mass shooting in Las Vegas. 50+ dead

[Amarok]

Looking through Guinn's book, it seems like sometimes he did indeed partake in the acid trips, sometimes he didn't. Like I said, I don't think exposure to violent media is anywhere near sufficient to lead to violence in real life, and Manson's a perfect case in why: The White Album has sold over 9.5 million copies in the US alone. Of the millions who listened to the albums, unless their first exposure to the album happened as a direct result of the Manson Murders, NOBODY would hear "Helter Skelter" and think it's a song about a race war that was meant to happen next summer, much less that it contained instructions for how to make that happen. At least, nobody whose brain wasn't addled with everything from LSD-induced psychosis (possibly) to Dale Carnegie (note: Manson got into Dale Carnegie [as well as Scientology] during one of his early stints in prison; Guinn uses excerpts from Dale Carnegie to contextualise a lot of Manson's actions, from his rare attempts at self-control to planning the Tate-LaBianca murders, but mostly, it's relevant to explaining how he managed to gain followers, even as Haight-Ashbury was saturated with hippie preachers).

And yes, I think a culture of violence exists that predates Hollywood, or even America. It's just that, for most of history, people considered the military as a suitable outlet for such violence: risk your life for your country, make sure the other poor SOB dies for his, and end up celebrated for it if your culture ends up on top. It seemed like a sweet deal until Nam (at least from an American perspective), and we got to see exactly what it was like. Suddenly, it didn't seem like there was much honour in it, especially after EVERYONE got saddled with the "baby killer" epithet because some asshole thought it would be a decent idea to destroy the village of My Lai due to faulty information. Not that much honour there, I'd reckon.

A culture of violence has been culture for a good portion of history . Id say our culture is tame by comparison to Ancient Sparta or Middle Age Europe . Were blood sports and celebrations of militarism were common . And no a Manson  does not create psycho killers. Only someone on the edge already would read plans for mass murder in a song let alone act on it. I think all this focus on blaming the media is just a distraction.