I feel like this time around is fast tracked version of what we've seen before. At least on my (American young-adult Facebook Feed) It's been ~24 hours now and we've gone from: - Initial reaction of shock, world leaders make statements. We listened to NPR on our drive home thru rush hour traffic. The numbers were still at 35 confirmed...then 40 confirmed. 7 locations, then 7 shooters...etc. - Shock echoed on social media, numbers go up and down and up again, most people sharing live threads from reputable news sources (BBC, NYTimes, Reuters) and sharing prayers. (When we got home (5pm PST)). Cue misinformation. - Started getting notifications that people I know in Paris were safe. Turns out, a whole crew of flimies I went to school there were on location for a shoot. Luckily, all safe. - "Remember that this is happening everywhere" ... "Beirut" ... "Pray for everyone not just Paris" ... and the first sign of what I take as "too cool for the standard 'my thoughts/prayers are with those in Paris' messages" - Muslims begin preemptively posting "remember these people are Muslim. I pray for Paris." and images about the difference between a Muslim and a terrorist. (No one has taken responsibility yet and no one official has blamed ISIS yet. But it has begun) - People begin changing profile pics to either: Eiffel tower drawing, pictures of them in Paris, or creative Paris/France related other things to show solidarity. - Misinformation, recaps of the idiotic things politicians have said, "guns in the hands of victims would have prevented this." (This morning (3am PST)). - Arguing about refugee crisis. Merkel makes statement. - Analysis on idiotic things people said the previous day. Dems bash GOP, GOP bash Dems. - Misinformation galore (Eiffle tower goes dark!) and personal stories come out, "my phone saved my life", "this american girl was one of the victims", more details emerge about the shooters and passports are found but who knows what is true or not at this point. - Discussions about gun laws, information collection, security, blame game begins. - Everyone changes their Facebook profile photos using Facebook's tool. - Refugee argument ensues again. One of the gunmen (?) supposedly arrived via refugee routes. Predictions and analysis of Merkel's earlier statement. - Preemptive predictions on tonights Dem debate. All we know for sure is it their talking points are being rehashed for Paris. - Analysis on design of the now iconic things we're seeing on our feeds begins. Analysis on Facebooks Safety feature begins. - Full blown confusion of blame, more details, videos, misinformation, grief, solidarity, "we should always be solidarity with everyone!", statements, more blame, more analysis, analysis on the analysis of the analysis. - This upcoming week: Profile pics slowly return to normal, factually accurate details emerge but are quickly swamped by other news stories so only their politicized remnants remain. No one gets nuked, but those calling for nuking make it easy for you to cull your friends list. - Next months: politics / war happens slowly and quietly, policies change, privacy invaded, security beefed up, everything returns to the new "normal".
Alright, so I wanted to update this because it's fairly interesting (to me at least—and it seems to some of you too.) In the past couple days I've seen this trend expand and explode: The backlash has been heavier than I expected, by a lot. So much that Facebook actually had to make a statement on why they turned on safety check for Paris but no where else. I think we will see a lot more backlash and analysis of people, the media (especially in the west), etc. Ugh. - I wasn't entirely surprised by France's bombing retaliation and I understand it, but don't necessarily think it's going to make anything any better. Furthermore, the ongoing shitstorm of arrests, the attackers' names coming out, etc. has kept the newsrooms busy. I see tons of these stories on my RSS feeds and twitter but not as much on my Facebook. My facebook seems generally obsessed with opinion pieces or analysis pieces and "why aren't you talking about XYZ" pieces. Cue outrage of the outrage:- "Remember that this is happening everywhere" ... "Beirut" ... "Pray for everyone not just Paris" ... and the first sign of what I take as "too cool for the standard 'my thoughts/prayers are with those in Paris' messages"
I have noticed that pretty much all of this "what about Beirut?" concern trolling has been carried out by conservatives who avoid participating in these trends of displaying support. They are clearly using this as an opportunity to score political points against what they see as a liberal hegemony in the media.
I'm seeing it on my liberal, young adult Facebook feed by arts students and the like and on sites like HuffPo. I don't know if it's strictly conservatives who are pushing it.
That's exactly where I'm seeing it too...granted that group contains 80% of my Facebook feed. It's still going on too, still noticing people posting articles and all that, but now things are starting to shift back towards Black Lives Matter and internal social issues, as it has been for the past lot of months.
That was a quality post. Thankful I never visit my FB. And now, inevitably, apparent Mizzou and Black Lives Matter protesters are taking to twitter to complain the Paris attacks are stealing their headlines because of.... white privliege I guess? But Mizzou says it all from outside agitators. I am so tired of this "SJW/anti-SJW" culture war stuff.