Tuesday, July 12, 2016

Editorial: How Does a Steady Stream of Images of Black Death Affect Us?

Scrolling through Instagram early Thursday morning after seeing a stream of photos of babies and beach scenes I stumbled on a short video clip of a wounded black man, Philando Castile, lying in the passenger seat of a car wearing a blood-soaked white T-shirt as an officer's gun pointed at him and his girlfriend Diamond Reynolds' camera phone rolled.

Moments after Castile was shot by a police officer in Falcon Heights, Minnesota Reynolds streamed the events live on Facebook. So far 5.6 million people viewed the video of Castile leaning over moaning before he died, the officer yelling and Reynolds giving a step-by-step commentary as her young daughter sat in the backseat. The video was shared more than 317,000 times.

By using social media to record the actions immediately after the shooting Reynolds took the public to the scene quicker than any news crew could. The public didn't have to wait for an official state release of dash cam footage. They saw the raw, unedited video immediately from the scene. Reynolds' social media broadcast revealed and recorded the last moments of Castile's life and the aftermath of the officer's actions in a way we wouldn't ordinarily get to see without social media. 

Click here for the full article.

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