The MUYUKA Accident had me thinking!
I want to talk about this idea of sharing, on social media, graphic imagery of accidents like the one in Muyuka . The debate on whether or not it is the right thing to do will continue coming up even after I have written this. When we had the Eseka train accident, social media was divided in opinion and now again, we are having to deal with the same issue.
I am not decided on what side to ride with on this one because sometimes, I scroll quickly over some close up images but I always want to see the extent of the damage just to be reminded of the many ways this life of mine could possibly end.
I believe many people who complain about such images will be glued to a TV screen if it was just a movie but they are so afraid of the same images when it comes to real life happenings -to the point where they want to claim some moral high ground over other people.
Facebook is not built on technology alone. Its rapid growth can be attributed to the fact that the technology is modeled around human psychology; the ability to have access to more information and being to chose one’s desired media for consumption being fundamental to the appeal of the platform.
Facebook’s algorithm tries to decipher the content of images and some of the time, it will alert the user of graphic content and have the user opt into viewing such content. I am not sure how effective and accurate the algorithm is but I am sure they are working on it and it will eventually get to an acceptable level of accuracy. That approach is the preferable one over refusing access to some people who do not share our opinions.
The most disturbing thing, to me, about the people who campaign against the posting of graphic images is the explanation for their opinion which is summarily a need for us to “respect the dead.” Ours is a society where people show more respect for the dead than for the living and I am finally at a point in my life where that hardly surprises me. And to think the dead do not share any of our human emotions only goes to speak about how much we fear the fact that when we die, we are no longer in control of what happens to our bodies since we spend spend so much time on earth ‘protecting our image.’
What such events should do for us is have us talk about the meaning of death granted we hardly even take the time to think of the meaning of life. We live our lives doing everything to run away from our inevitable fate. We happen to be the only species that is obsessed with preserving our lives at the expense of everything else around us. Our actions in that light will, no doubt, eventually lead to the earth purging us from its environment in order to preserve itself - a topic of for another day.
Any-Ha!
Death will come anytime and after that, you won’t have control of anything on this earth. So while you are here, do not feel the need to claim ownership of anything. Do not feel the need to have it all for yourself.
Do not worry about the dead. They are doing much better than you and I.