While it will seem ridiculous to Americans, this incident could have some effect on tourists coming to the US from Europe. Europeans aren't used to the idea of teenagers openly blasting away at each other in the streets. (Urinating, yes, but not shooting.)
Not too many years ago the European press was making a big deal about the dangers of crime in Miami. Floridians were quick to point out that because Florida competes with southern Europe for tourist dollars, the press had a conflict of interest and was in the tank for its own continent. Lately it's been suggested that other interests competing for tourist dollars are dong the same thing to RP, and there could be some truth to that. We should be able to rely on the press to be objective and thorough about such matters, but they seem to welcome any controversy someone will feed them. When potential tourists read that one of their own kind has been murdered in a foreign country, the competition immediately gets an effective poster child.
Most people, even educated people, seem to operate more on emotion than by figuring probabilities, especially with subjects with which they aren't real familiar and aren't sure how to navigate through all the variables. Most Americans aren't real familiar with Mexico and especially not with the situation in Rocky Point, and they simply don't see any reason to take chances. I've had several people turn down my invitations to join us for a Rocky Point excursion, and that's been their reasoning. (Along with the fact that some of them may regard me as something of a risk-taker and aren't sure they'd be in the safest hands to begin with.) Even one senseless murder of an innocent tourist in Rocky Point doing what most of us do will likely be enough to take American tourism down to about half its present level, which is already struggling. That's not how it should be, but it's how it is.
