If They Gunned Me Down
Monday, August 11, 2014 - 10:30 AM
Brown was eighteen years old. In the NBC News tweet about the story, the network chose a photo of an unsmiling Brown standing outside of a nondescript building, wearing a basketball jersey.
Corrected Link: Unarmed Missouri teen killed by officer after 'physical confrontation' http://t.co/JITP7e9iJa pic.twitter.com/t4CNLdq6C4
— NBC News (@NBCNews) August 10, 2014
In the photo, Brown is making what looks to me like a
straightforward peace sign with his left hand. Some online commenters
interpreted the hand gesture as a 'gang sign.'
@NBCNews THAT HAPPENS TO BE A GANG MEMBER SIGN!!
— bufordisaacs (@bufordisaacs) August 10, 2014
The police say that Brown struggled with a cop over the gun. Brown's
family is very skeptical, as is the larger African-American community
in Ferguson. A photo can be an argument, and the photo NBC News chose
made a different argument than a more typical victim photo (at a
graduation, or at home) would have. In response, people of color began
tweeting pairs of photos of themselves under the hashtag #IfTheyGunnedMeDown.
This is a rhetorical question. And that makes me sad. #iftheygunnedmedown which picture would they use? pic.twitter.com/86UCAa4QHE
— Steve Marmel (@Marmel) August 10, 2014
#IfTheyGunnedMeDown what picture would they use pic.twitter.com/lJ3k3tT63n
— King Ghidorah (@__TrillClinton) August 11, 2014
#IfTheyGunnedMeDown which photo would they use? pic.twitter.com/y3y8tFHtPN
— Aug. 25th #AVO (@WhoISdeante) August 11, 2014
Among other things, this is what social media in general, and Twitter
in particular, is good at. It's hard to talk through the semiotics of
an NBC News social media editor's photo choice. You can spend a long,
bogged-down time using words to parse pictures. It's easier, clearer,
and more powerful to see that argument made with just a few words and a
couple of pictures.
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