Judged in the court of Facebook
Move aside, VPD: Facebook is not just a helper in bringing Vancouver rioters to justice, but is becoming a virtual courtroom as well.
Since the Stanley Cup riot, numerous pages such as Facebook riot pics have posted photos of people smashing windows, tipping over urinals and brawling with police. There has also been a move for identification and public shaming of the people who were shown taking part in the mayhem.
Brock Anton is a Facebook user who made national headlines for posting incriminating evidence of himself on burning cars during the riots. There is now a public Facebook page devoted to shaming him---there for strangers to post hateful messages about his criminal acts. Thousands of Facebook users, ranging from senior citizens to high school students, have left taunts and insults on the page. Nathan Kotylak, a water polo all-star athlete with a scholarship to the University of Calgary, was attacked on Facebook after photos emerged of him lighting a police cruiser on fire.
Friends and defenders of the rioters pleaded with the administrator to take the page down yesterday, only to be bombarded with hateful attacks themselves -- within hours, they took down their posts, while the hate posts continued to stream in.
Facebook and Twitter are watching
"Over the last 10 years, I've been thinking Orwell got it wrong," said Peter Chow-White, an SFU communications professor specializing in social media. "There's not going to be this oppressive Big Brother eye watching us. We give out the minutiae of our lives for free on Twitter and Facebook."
While photographs and video footage posted by the public (and often by the perpretators themselves) have been instrumental in bringing them to justice, Chow-White said that tools like Facebook risk putting ordinary people on the same playing field as powerful politicians and celebrities whose lives are built around public exposure.
"We're used to politicians, celebrities, professional athletes living in public --that's just part of the extraordinary wages they garner," he said. "But everyday people are not used to living in public. That's not part of the deal."
"I've seen at least one report of someone being fired already because they they had pictures at the riot. With social media, there's guilt by association. What's removed is any sort of due process. For people to be fired right away because they saw you in a photo...what they were doing was not done in the workplace."
Breakdown of community
Alexandra Samuel, social media director at Emily Carr University, wrote a blog post in the Harvard Business Review website about the disturbing trend of citizen surveillance, with people on Twitter and Facebook calling on the public to identify criminals in the riot.
"I was deeply disturbed to see the community of social media enthusiasts embrace a new role: not in observation, not in citizen journalism, but in citizen surveillance," she wrote.
She said that while documenting with photographs and video are an integral part of social media, citizens cross the line when they begin to post footage with the explicit intention of identifying people.
screenshot from Harvard Business Review blog
Samuel wrote that while it may be constructive to identify someone involved in car burnings during the riots, there are many cases where social media is used wrongfully:
"I am much less comfortable when I think about other ways that crowdsourced surveillance has been or might be put to use: By pro-life demonstrators posting photos of women going into clinics that provide abortions. By informants in authoritarian states tracking posts and tweets critical of the government. By employers that scan Facebook to see which of their employees have been tagged in photos on Pride Day or 4/20."
The Vancouver riots, Samuel said, show how social media can be used not just to create a sense of community and public safety, but also to destroy it.
"What social media is for — or what it can be for, if we use it to its fullest potential — is to create community. And there is nothing that will erode community faster, both online and off, than creating a society of mutual surveillance."
What are the options?
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(36) Comments
.. Our so called "society" in Vancouver is quickly rearing its disformed, ugly head and we are now approaching Dark Ages level of intelligence and attitude.
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No Vigilante Justice Unless Justice Not Served
How about this....no vigilante justice unless judges give these clowns a slap on the wrist with a small fine and community service. If that's all they get, then we should take care of these guys. Eg. Destroy their cars...loot their property, beat them up, etc. Hopefully the city, VPD, business owners, etc all file lawsuits against these clowns and get back the amount of money to restore everything back to normal, plus interest!
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Clearly this mentality screams "terrorism", an eye for an eye; we don't live in a country dictated by Sharia law.
Dramatic much?
The people in the photos burning our city posed to have their picture taken knowing it could be online and in the hands of the police.
It's amazing what has become socially acceptable. I'm guessing you've had a few good chuckles over some poor shmuck on you tube captured in an embarressing moment for the whole world to see. I highly doubt they wanted that up there, then went viral and that's ok. But when people purposly commit crimes on camera and brag about it, and the community comes together to humiliate them so they learn their lesson, well that's just wrong.
I'm sick and tired of the typical Vancouver attitude of don't get involved, let someone else deal with it. That's why we have a no fun city.
The police handled this in 1994 and it did NOTHING to prevent it this time, perhaps having their image and name spread throughout the internet will snap them into line and prevent others from thinking it's ok to tear up a city for fun.
.. Our so called "society" in Vancouver is quickly rearing its disformed, ugly head and we are now approaching Dark Ages level of intelligence and attitude.
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No Vigilante Justice Unless Justice Not Served
How about this....no vigilante justice unless judges give these clowns a slap on the wrist with a small fine and community service. If that's all they get, then we should take care of these guys. Eg. Destroy their cars...loot their property, beat them up, etc. Hopefully the city, VPD, business owners, etc all file lawsuits against these clowns and get back the amount of money to restore everything back to normal, plus interest!
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Clearly this mentality screams "terrorism", an eye for an eye; we don't live in a country dictated by Sharia law.
With such a strong anti bully movement in the schools over the last number of years i am PROUD of the general public coming together to out the individuals that they can who partook in the horrendous events that unfolded downtown on wednesday night. My children and i were home wednesday watching game seven and were sad to see our canucks take a loss but, im sorry to say it, boston owned that series point blank .... i have never been a hockey fan NOR a canucks fan but i AM a fan of vancouver and that is why i have been watching the games ... i was proud of OUR team just like im proud of OUR city ... i was mortified to see the violence and the buffoonery that unfolded as the game came to an end ... i know that my kids are taught in school about bullying and how it isnt acceptable and that the right thing to do when you see someone bullying someone is to stand up for the victim ... in the footage i saw of wednesday night i saw a number of people doing so ... that is commendable... and in the aftermath of the riots what i am seeing is people coming together to stand together againt the people who thought it was 'fun' to bully and beat up on our city ... these acts shouldnt go unpunished and all people should see that it is not acceptable to behave like an uncivilized goon ... its called making an example ... i truly hope that the legal system will not fail us in regards to these culprits
@Grammer Hero thinks they are funny and perfect too? Wow, the total package..........
So u never make typos right?
DUMBASS!
If it was just a typo why get so bent out of shape? Anyway, I wasn't referring to the typo (enought) I was commenting on your CDD (contraction deficit disorder). It is common but is often indicative of more than simply a "typo".
Regardless, I understand people make mistakes, which was my point in the first place. I'm sorry (but not surprised) you failed to understand the irony.
Speaking of irony, studies show that less intelligent people are quick to call others names that question intellect (stupid, dumb, dumbass...) as a defence mechanism of their own emotional and intellectual inadequacies.
Just something to think about...
The problem with the online mob retaliation, is that there is NO due process. Yes those guilty of breaking the law should be punished appropriately, in ACCORDANCE with the law. But because someone was caught in a photo near or at the riots, does not necessarily mean they were participating, or even observing. Perhaps they were trying to get out. Maybe they stopped for a second to see and obverse what was going on. Ever slowed down for a wreck on the highway?
People are getting crazy trying to crucify anyone who was even there. Where do you think all the photos and videos of "evidence" came from? The ones that everyone is lauding for enabling police to catch the criminals? They are from observers at the very least. Should they too go to jail cause they were there and watching it all go down? Would their "evidence", if used on another trial, be called into question because it was provided by person charged or convicted at their own trial? What about the two kissers? Can we be sure that they WERENT involved in the riots prior to the kiss, or even following it? It gets silly very quickly.
Its a giant pit of steaming gossip and anger: "A Bruins fan was thrown from the bridge by a canucks fan" "Many idiots were stabbing people." "Bigfoot came out of the woods and flipped a cop car." Erroneous at best. Not only are the photos sometimes misleading, the game of verbal and written "telephone" back and forth between broadcast media and social media is ridiculous. Light the torches and break down the door. Get 'em, boys! As outrageous in civil society as a riot without reason.
Let the police do their jobs. They've repeatedly requested this from the public. Turn in obvious and incriminating photos to aid in a case against a perpetrator. But do not start phoning their employers and firing death threats at their friends and family. This is illegal too, and frankly exhibits the behavior you say you deplore.