The on-air shooting of a TV reporter and cameraman in Virginia was shocking enough, but even more jarring is the video apparently filmed by a former coworker suspected of carrying out the attack. The suspect shooter posted the footage on social media.
Some Facebook and Twitter users complained that the video turned up in their feeds and automatically played the horrific scene of the gunman fatally shooting reporter Alison Parker and cameraman Adam Ward. Others shared the video on social media, prompting some to use the hashtag #dontwatch. Both Facebook and Twitter suspended the accounts believed to have belonged to the gunman later identified by authorities as Vester L. Flanagan, 41, who used the on-air name Bryce Williams.
With autoplay, viewers don’t know what they’re in for, especially with the chilling footage of the Wednesday morning shooting. So viewers don’t have the chance to brace themselves psychologically for what’s to come, said Arthur Lurigio, psychology and criminal justice professor at Loyola University Chicago.
“It’s disturbing. It’s frightening. And it can lead to people who are already anxious and have a view of the world as being dangerous, it’s going to exacerbate those feelings,” he said.
Rosanna Guadagno, associate psychology professor and professor in emerging media and communication at the University of Texas at Dallas, agreed that unexpectedly watching the video can be distressing and can affect people’s moods and upset them.
“People are recording all sorts of things and uploading them, good, bad and ugly. It’s a strange sort of society we’re living in that people are reaching us through our computers with horrible misdeeds,” Guadagno said. “We have to set our own restrictions if we want to protect ourselves from viewing these things.”
From a tech standpoint, social media platforms can’t monitor every video and censor them all in real time, she said. Users, however, can disable the auto-play function.
If users limit what they’re viewing and sharing, it could help decrease the potential for copycats, she said.
From the shooting of Robert Kennedy in 1968 and the tragic events of Sept. 11 to ISIS executions and the deadly beating of Fenger High School student Derrion Albert in Chicago, this is not the first time violence has been caught on camera, unfolded live on TV or been shared on social media.
What is extremely rare is that the gunman is believed to have filmed the killing from his vantage point and shared that footage publicly, Lurigio said. There have been instances in which serial killers recorded video but didn’t intend to share it with the world, he said.
“He wants this to be shocking. He wants people to be upset about this. He wants people to not forget him and the people he killed,” Lurigio said. “He wanted to make sure we could see the whole thing transpire from beginning to end.”
It suggests to Lurigio that it’s a self-aggrandizing act intended to show how powerful the shooter was, much like how ISIS tries to convey power and fear in its videos, but one main difference is that the terrorist group does it for political and recruitment purposes, he said.
If the shooter simply wanted revenge, he could have committed the crime quietly without the dramatic flair, Lurigio added.
“To show them being shot and to post this is building his sense of power and importance, and at the same time I believe it’s very disrespectful and degrading to the people he shot,” Lurigio said.
Los Angeles Times and Associated Press contributed.
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