When a society is more interested in what they are recording/filming on their cell phones rather than what is actually happening, I think we have reached a critical point where we can all agree there is a problem. These days a house in a neighborhood could be burning, people will gladly walk by and start filming instead of helping at least till the fire department gets there.
On May 25th, 2020, a man by the name of George Floyd was murdered by Police. Police arrested George Floyd for passing a fake $20.0 bill at the grocery store. According to the story told Floyd purchased cigarettes and was asked to return the Cigarettes the store called the police and that is when Floyd had an encounter with the Police. An encounter that cost him his life. The police officer claims he was resisting arrest and so the officer pressed his knee on Mr. Floyd’s neck for 8 mins and 46 seconds. The interesting part is that the whole incident was filmed on someone’s cell phone, thanks to new technology you may say, but people standing by were pleading with the Officer to at least stand-up, get off his neck, because Floyd was yelling out, “I can’t breathe”. He already had Floyd in handcuffs.
People did nothing but film the incident, I’m not calling for an attack on the police, but they didn’t do anything, even didn’t call 911, that could have saved his life. They did not call extra police, they just kept filming. It seems in this day and age, because of our addiction to our cell phones and social media we have actually forgotten how to be responsible citizens. If someone’s house was burning as I said before, we might have to help before the fire department gets there. In this era, people will be the first to film and then post it on social media before they even think about doing anything else.
Cell phones these days are becoming more and more sophisticated, our lives are more and more connected to this device. The integration of social media platforms and cell phones made it possible to have access to social media platforms 24 hours a day and even broadcast live in most cases. In this always “connected” world people will rather be a Facebook citizen, Instagram citizen, than a responsible one. we always pay attention to things like drug epidemics, suicides, but somehow we have left out social media addiction, which in itself is an epidemic. I’m just an individual writing an article, but if this is not true, then why do we have social media addiction centers?? During Floyd’s incident, people were standing by for 8, that is enough to save a life. Paramedics would have told the officer to move, so they can administer first aid…….
Then followed waves of protest, all across the nation, it even went international. Another interesting fact, the same thing happened over and over again during the protest, riots, and looting. People went with their cell phones, filmed themselves at the protest, some even started broadcasting live, ( narcissism at its best). Some stood in front of the police officers, provoking them, and trying to get a reaction while filming so they can get “content” for their social media platforms. It is almost as if the people protesting didn’t go there to protest but to get on social media and act as if they were actually there to protest. Of course, our “holy” celebrities don’t make it easier, they have people who follow them on social media religiously,
The ironic part of all this was people didn’t realize that they were making the same mistake which partially caused the death of Mr. Floyd, No one did anything but stand there and film. I’m not saying they should have attacked the police,(AGAIN) but something as little as calling 911 when he first shouted “ I can’t breathe” may have saved his life. An ex-officer David Dorn, lost his life while trying to protect a store, while he was bleeding to death someone was filming instead of calling 911, he wanted to be the first to capture the footage.
Cell phones are a necessity in today’s word, but it is out of control, it has become the most important thing in our lives. Ladies and Gentlemen welcome to the attention society, and the most important vehicle in this attention society are our smartphones. I will say this, like everything else moderation is the key, we have big corporations and social media companies who dissect and play with our emotions, the more addicted we are, the more money they make, it is in their best interest to keep us glued to our phones. This is a point where we as a society should pause and say “ this is getting out of hand, and we must do something about it”. The police are human beings too, so we can’t expect every police officer to be perfect, or even good, what the INDIVIDUAL police did was wrong, he ended up killing a man, I don’t know what his intentions were, we leave that for the courts to decide and find out but at least at this man’s funeral, it shouldn’t be all about police brutality, it should also be about the mental health of which social media is a big part of. I don’t expect our politicians to do anything about it, they actually benefit from social media, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez called facebook a public health risk, of course after her campaign benefitted from its use. I haven’t heard anything from the media about this issue.
Like I said before, moderation is the key, and let us give ourselves the chance to integrate responsible citizenry and social media, I’m just one man but I have started the conversation, hopefully, a few people will join in so we can get the ball rolling. This is a better idea than defunding the police. if we can do this to fast-food restaurants and push them to become more health-oriented, then we can also push these big corporations to address mental health and how addictive social media can be.
