The NRA's Wayne LaPierre cited Natural Born Killers as one cause of gun violence. His reference may not be current, but the 1994 film has a long history of blame.
In today’s scattered NRA press conference, the group’s Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre placed the blame for the Sandy Hook massacre on everything from hurricanes to celebrities. When referencing violent movies, he did a little digging: “We have blood-soaked films out there like American Psycho, Natural Born Killers. They’re aired like propaganda loops on Splatterdays and every single day.”
A few notes: “Splatterday” is not a thing. Neither of those movies air every single day – or at any frequency close to that. And the references are a little dated. American Psycho came out in 2000 (and the novel was published way back in 1991). Natural Born Killers, on the other hand, is over 18 years old: it was released August 1994.
Source: movieposterdb.com
Timely or not, there’s a reason Natural Born Killers is invoked so often in the “violent movies cause violent crimes” argument: it’s the easiest target. While Oliver Stone says he intended his film to be a satire on the media’s obsession with and inadvertent glorification of violence, some viewers missed the point. Among them, over a dozen murderers who either cited Natural Born Killers or were linked to the film after their crimes.
The most relevant example in the wake of the Sandy Hook massacre is Columbine High shooters Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold. Harris referred to April 20, the day they murdered 12 students and one teacher, as “the holy morning of NBK.” In discussing how Hollywood would eventually adapt their story, Klebold and Harris proposed (among others) Quentin Tarantino, who is credited with writing the story for Natural Born Killers.
