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This is frustrating, but it isn't only guns.
For instance, look at the reporting on the collision between the Navy EP-3 and the Chinese fighter.
The Chinese fighter should have yielded right of way because it was intercepting.
The Chinese fighter should have yielded right of way because it was more maneuverable.
The Chinese fighter should have yielded right of way because its cockpit design affords better visibility.
These are international rules of the road, and would not have been hard for reporters or editors to discover. Yet the international, and even the US, media often as not went along with the Chinese meme of "the aggressor P3 caused the accident."
Don't even get me started on the JFK, Jr reporting. Guy went flying with a not fully healed broken leg/foot (have fun operating rudder pedal and brake), proceeding into conditions requiring more instrument training than he had, and pushed into weather that caused him to lose orientation and either a) spin or b) spiral a perfectly good airplane into the ocean. Press coverage on that looked for flaws in the airplane; implied general aviation was unsafe; yada yada yada.
I could look at motorcycles, boats, etc; the point is that while malfeasance in reporting is possible (and likely in the case of guns), a lot of bad reporting is due to outright laziness, and a failure to consult subject matter experts.
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