How not to win friends on social media

Almost a decade ago a Tamil newspaper published the photograph of a young woman tied to a tree. The woman’s hair was dishevelled, her face was streaked with tears, her clothes had been pulled down. She was surrounded by a motley group of villagers, who were taking turns to intimidate, and even beat her. It was more like a kangaroo court that was convinced that the young woman had abducted a child.

Someone phoned the newspaper’s photographer, and he arrived on the scene. His arrival made the crowd even more raucous. The photographer took the hapless woman’s picture from different news angles. One of these photographs was published the next morning on the front page of the newspaper.

The question that arises here is: What was the first duty of the photographer as a concerned citizen? To help the woman? Or to take a newsy photograph?

This is a question that confronts newsmen often as they go around performing their job. During the anti-reservation struggle in New Delhi in the 1980s a young man immolated himself. The immolation was carried in front of news photographers. The goal clearly was to inflame passions, and make the media take notice of the anger on the streets.

The protesters succeeded. For a few days, New Delhi literally came to a halt. Once again the question that arose was: Should the newsmen who were present on the spot saved the boy? Or should they have left it to the police and other bystanders while they took photographs?

The 21st century has given a new dimension to this ethical dilemma. Today, every person carries a camera phone. Many have video recording facilities on their phone. There are several who are on the lookout for opportunities to record incidents that can have wide viewership.

The unfortunate fall of a visitor in the tiger’s den in Delhi zoo this year triggered two kinds of reactions. One was of concerned citizens and zoo guards. They raised a din to distract the tiger. The second group saw in the youth’s misfortune a great opportunity to film the tragedy. This group took out their mobile phones and captured the youth’s dying moments. The videos were published on YouTube; some enthusiasts even shared their videos with the media.

It is hard to explain such opportunistic behaviour. What did the group get? Fifteen minutes of fame on national media? A few thousand downloads on YouTube? And what was the cost? Their conscience. Instead of helping a young man in distress, they were busy recording the youth’s dying moments.

This is not the only incident where the citizens became interested bystanders in recording the misery of others. Three African youth, who were attacked by a group of commuters at the Rajiv Chowk station in New Delhi, were a source of similar voyeurism.

Many commuters were busy focusing their mobile phones on the phone booth and capturing the fear on the face of cowering African students. They did not make any effort to pacify their fellow commuters or save the trapped Africans.

There is little doubt that social media has given a new direction to video opportunism. There are thousands of individuals who are on the lookout for news moments. But these social media enthusiasts should stop and ponder as to what is more important? Capturing someone’s horror, fright or grief on their mobile phones or rising to the occasion and rescuing fellow citizens from harm?