Before it was confirmed, there were pictures. Pictures taken just through the doors of the MEN Arena in Manchester, with smoke obscuring much of the scene but bodies still discernable on the floor. Before any news reporters had filed their copy or government officials were able to comment, shocked onlookers and concertgoers were on the scene showing the world what had happened.
Whichever way you look at it, the terrorist attack at the Ariana Grande concert last night is a tragedy – whether it was heavily reported or not, children were targeted by an ideological idiot. But for those of us out of harm’s way, sitting at home and trying to make sense of the situation, it can feel overwhelming. Frightening and confusing in a way it couldn’t be if you saw one item about it on the 6 O’Clock News.
There has been a lot of fake news doing the rounds online after the attack – see more about that here – but even when the news is real it can feel somehow more upsetting.
Social media is now how we see breaking news stories. Where a rolling news channel would have been our first port of call during a story – think even a few years ago to constant coverage of Raoul Moat – it’s now done on Facebook and Twitter. This is all incredibly obvious information, but what makes the news feel perhaps scarier is the fact there is no voice of authority or guiding figure as the story unfolds. Instead, it’s wild guesswork, baseless allegations, and unfiltered, unmoderated pictures and anecdotes from the scene.
The history of us getting breaking news on social media is quite naturally short. If you cast your mind all the way back to 2013, we can see one of the defining moments in breaking news in a digital-first world. The Boston Bombing broke first as horrified bystanders uploaded pictures and eyewitness accounts to social media. As emergency services rushed to the scene, the manhunt for the culprits began.
On Reddit, a user set up a page dedicated to sieving through pictures from the day in order to work out who did it. On /r/findbostonbombers users did whatever is the digital equivalent of rolling up their sleeves. They did help the FBI find a Facebook page they would not have otherwise seen, but it also generated a lot of false information and, as is brilliantly outlined in this article, resulted in witch hunts.
Reddit apologised. ‘Though started with noble intentions, some of the activity on Reddit fueled online witch hunts and dangerous speculation which spiralled into very negative consequences for innocent parties,’ the statement read. ‘The Reddit staff and the millions of people on Reddit around the world deeply regret that this happened.’
The reason that some Reddit users took leave of their senses in 2013 is the reason that you may have changed your Facebook profile picture to the Tricolour flag after the Paris attacks, or retweeted pleas to find missing people after the horrific attack in Manchester last night. It’s a place that allows us to react to the news and register our sorrow and dismay.
However, we’re getting the information via a medium that invites us to respond. The medium almost goads us: 'are you going to do nothing, or try to make a difference?' This has to have an impact on how the attacks affect us psychologically. It’s not just information we’re being given, it also can feel like an invitation.
There has been an embarrassment of studies recently about the potentially negative psychological impact that heavy social media use can have, such as this one from the University of Pittsburgh that links it to depression, or this poll that showed it makes young people feel anxious and inadequate.
This can feed into Post Traumatic Stress disorder, too. Phil Parker, psychologist and founder of The Lightning Process says that with PTSD, 'patients report how they relive the trauma after the event as if it is playing on a loop tape - a social media feed, with its multiple reports of traumatic events can replicate this, recreating the traumatic responses each time we read a post.'
'If we tune in to watch the News at 10 we are already prepared for the potential of bad news - but we may check into our social media feed for many other reasons and with traumatic events unfolding directly into it, it can produce more shock in our unprepared nervous systems.'
Pamela Rutledge, Director of the Media Psychology Research Center, explained to Psychology Today that we do react more strongly to news of terror attacks on social media because we naturally focus on danger, but it’s not necessarily a negative thing.
'Through social media, we experience tragedies actions in an intense and forceful way,' she said. 'Our brains are hardwired to focus on the bad and dangerous, continually scanning the environment for any uncertainty that poses a threat to our survival. We instinctively try to make sense out of the unexplainable to alleviate our own fear and discomfort. But the best use of social media is the next step – the outpouring of positive emotions, the emotional and physical support, and the political unity that come together in response. The shift in emotion from fear to empathy to strength and purpose helps all of us.'
Things seem more frightening when they’re unfolding in real-time on your twitter timeline. Information feels closer to us, more frightening and relevant when it’s coming out of the machine and on the same medium you use to talk to your friends and look at pictures of Pomeranians. You see the terrible waste of human life in ways you couldn’t before. This doesn’t have to be a bad thing. It can also be a reminder of who you are, what you believe in, and galvanise a positive reaction. If social media is prompting you for a response, make yours a good one.
You might also be interested in:
Fake News Has Spread Across Social Media In The Wake Of The Manchester Arena Terror Attack
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.