The Green Review

It seems to me that the tirade of sanctimonious  – and sometimes sickening – posts on facebook is getting heavier of late. Not only do these really irritate me, but I also fail to see the point of them.

To give you some examples of what has annoyed me recently, try these:

The first one was a picture of what was obviously a very late aborted baby laying in the hands of a surgeon. Yes a very sad picture, but did I want to come across that while looking through my facebook timeline? No. I bloody well didn’t. The oddest thing about this was that the person who shared it was commenting “this is horrible picture and shouldn’t be on facebook”. Well don’t hit the flippin’ share button then!

The second picture was (yet another) one of these animal cruelty pictures. This time it looked as if a dog had a really nasty injury to its mouth and there was blood everywhere. Thanks for that – just what I wanted to see, especially as my 7-year old was looking over my shoulder.

Apart from the fact that these pictures really annoy me, I also have to ask; do the people posting them, sharing them and making some self-righteous comment about then actually know the provenance of these photos? Do they know where they come from? Was the baby aborted to save the mother, who subsequently then had to suffer the virtual loss of a child? Was the baby aborted because it was already dead? Was this photo picked up from a medical journal or a memo circulated to paediatric surgeons? Is the picture a fake?

In the photo of the dog I noticed that the background didn’t seem to be that of a domestic home, due to the clinical-looking wall and ceiling tiles. Also the dog had a nice big full bowl of food – not a usual practice for animal abusers. Maybe this was an animal hospital and the dog had a wound that had reopened? Maybe the dog had fallen? Who knows? Again, I wonder if the picture is either fake or taken out of context.

What I do know is that people should perhaps engage their brains before they jump on the social bandwagon and start condemning something they actually know diddly squat about.

If you are a person who loves to share these types of picture, think about this: Perhaps these animal abuse photos are actually designed to be circulated around the Internet by the abusers themselves and by re-posting them you may be actually supporting what you think you are condemning. Perhaps the animals are abused for the very reason these photos can be taken. There are sick people out there who do thrive on the instant “fame” such actions can result in: “I put this picture out on facebook and it got shared 100,000 times…” Think about it.

Do these re-posters live by morals that are above the rest of us?

I admit that I will re-post environmental articles that I feel may be of interest to others or that I feel strongly about. But at least I can say that I make every effort that is feasible to live a sustainable life (apart from the amount of travelling I do, but that’s for work and also something I’m trying to change). My point is: these people who are so shocked at pictures of animal cruelty, are they vegetarians? Do they eat organic meat? Do they know where their meat comes from and that the livestock is kept in conditions that do not invoke any suffering? Do they worry about palm oil and the effect that has on wildlife around the world? Maybe some do – but not many.

When I post something up on facebook, I keep it clean and I would definitely not want to shock someone with anything I post. Besides, shock tactics have rarely been proven to work.

Additionally, these pictures are not informing me of something I’m ignorant to. I know late abortions are happening, I know animals are mistreated. I don’t need nasty pictures on facebook to remind me of this.

If all of these photos came with a link to donate to a relevant charity, a petition to lobby the government or some other means of making them relevant and useful, then fair enough. But the majority of them don’t. They are just sad people wallowing in a sad world they feel they must impose on the rest of us.

I could pull a million sick photos off the Internet and circulate them around my social media networks, but why would I want to. Why do others want to?

It reminds me of a video I watched when I was younger that showed people dying in a multitude of different ways. The intro to this video said something like “we have brought you this film because we want you to see the futility of killing”, or some other crap along those lines. What they should have said was, “we bring you this video because you’re sick bastards who enjoy watching others die, but we can’t actually say that, so we have to pretend this is for pious reasons instead”. What a load of nonsense.

If there was no harm in circulating these photos, then fair enough, but many people look at facebook with their kids in the room, or are just looking to connect with friends or find a funny little youtube clip to watch.

I will admit that I am as fascinated by the macabre as the next man and that when a BBC News reporter says, “some of the scenes you about to witness may be disturbing”, I feel even more compelled to watch. But that’s my choice and I get warned beforehand. Having nasty photos sprung on me when I’m just looking for some facebook funnies isn’t… well… funny.

Re-post this is you agree… Blagh!

GR

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