This is my job… (WARNING–disturbing content)
Friends and family often ask me, “what do you do at work?” My response is usually something along the lines of , “Oh, well, you know–I follow how digital media and the internet impact human rights work. I try to figure out what to do with digital documents and websites and stuff that could be useful to human rights work in the future–that kind of thing.” Ironically, given my Little Luddite status, I spend much of my day following social-media on-line, looking at YouTubes, reading webpages about digital technology, and that sort of thing. It’s all pretty peaceful and sometimes boring, or even frustrating (since I’d really rather not spend this much time with technology on any given day).
Witnessing
But sometimes I come across something that is so utterly heartbreaking and enraging that I just don’t know what to do with it. This is one of them: The shooting of Oscar Grant by BART Police in San Francisco on New Year’s Day this year. In viewing this video, I have, in effect, witnessed the murder of a citizen of the United States by those who are supposed to protect him.
WARNING!!!! The link above leads to graphic video footage of the shooting. This footage was created by a witness with a cell phone. It really does show a man being shot and killed.
This outrageous violation of human rights took place right here in the United States? Oscar Grant was unarmed. It appears that the police officers lost their temper, pinned him down, and shot him in the back at point-blank range, execution-style. It breaks my heart. It makes me furious. This isn’t supposed to happen here. We live in a civilized society where police officers defend the good. My stomach hurts….
Only a coward…
How do the sayings go? Hmm… Let me see…
Only a coward shoots a man when he’s down.
Only a coward shoots a man in the back.
Only a coward shoots an unarmed man.
The pros drop the ball and the amateurs run with it
If you look further into this story, you’ll find out that not even local news media paid it much attention. It seems that everything that could be done to hide this event from the public view was done, which is deplorable and despicable.
This is wrong–every fiber of my being rejects this!
Fortunately, plenty of people captured this event with portable digital devices (you’ll see another person in this recording using their digital camera to record this execution). And those videos got circulated around the web, raising awareness and calling for action. The particular video at the link above, at the time that it was imported to that particular website, had been viewed over 4000 times.
That is powerful social action.
