Social media and the exploitation of loss

Reporters for the mainstream news media have to be careful about the way they cover losses of life and other grim tragedies. Too often, certainly in Thailand, they are criticised not for delivering “fake news” but for trying to make the news “too real”. 
Not that long ago, reporters and cameramen competed for pictures and descriptions of horrific accident and crime scenes. The more gruesome the imagery, it was believed, the more newspapers were sold and the bigger the viewing audience. Gradually a more caring, ethical approach came to be adopted, accompanied all along by debate over freedom of expression and “the right to know”.
All that seems quaint now that we’re in the age of mobile phone-cameras and “citizen reporters”. Families of crash victims cannot be surprised to find videos of the accident occurring and even photos of their loved one’s corpse circulating online. And those images could well stay online forever. 
We are a society of social media, and for all the benefits they otherwise bring, the sharing networks are driven by tantalising immediacy and sensationalism that frequently feeds on terrible incidents and deplorable acts that the conventional news media might shun for fear of offending sensibilities. On the receiving end of the brutal instant coverage are friends and relatives coping with deep loss, celebrities whose reputations are challenged, and minors whose errors or ordeals are being recorded to haunt them throughout their lives.
One of the most difficult aspects of journalism to teach rookies is how the media should handle tragedies and other stories that encroach on individual privacy. There is a rule of thumb – you ask how you would want the news presented if the subject was someone near and dear to you. But this guideline is seemingly ignored when there’s a major transport accident or some celebrity endures heartbreak. 
Sensationalism is like the tango – it takes two. This is why newspapers that in the past routinely published corpse photos never yielded to pressure to back away. There were simply too many readers wanting to see that kind of photo. Such people enjoy their guilty pleasure – and the gorier the image, the bigger the thrill. Newspapers and TV news shows now pixelate the gore away if they show the imagery at all, but news followers with an unsatisfied appetite for nastiness can get occasional fixes on the social media. The awful pictures and heart-rending content that the mainstream media avoid are going viral online. One wonders how long the mainstream media can maintain their ethical resolve before the drive to be competitive has them following suit.
We have seen the social networks – unthinkingly but perhaps inadvertently – attack the wrong people and praise heroes who turned out to be villains. Even if the truth emerged, the damage was already done and usually irreparable. In some cases, the truth might never be as widely known as the falsity, leaving the innocent unjustly punished and the guilty undeservedly rewarded.
We can only address this problem as individuals. Where the mainstream media have supervising agencies that can bring news outlets to book for violating guidelines, there are no such reins on the social media. They are wild and free, which is part of the excitement they arouse, but every user of the social media has to keep in mind the inherent danger that lies in being wild.