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Put A Red Cross PSA In Front Of the ISIS Beheading Video

Posted by samzenpus on from the for-the-greater-good dept.

Bennett Haselton writes After footage of James Foley's beheading by ISIS terrorists was posted online on Tuesday, Twitter and Youtube elected to remove any footage or links to the footage posted by users. Obviously this reduces the incentive for terrorist groups to post such content, by shrinking their audience, but it also reduces the public's access to information. Would it be ethical to make the content available, if it was preceded by an advertisement for a cause that runs counter to everything ISIS stands for? Read below to see what Bennett has to say.

This Slate article by Lily Hay Newman summarizes the pros and cons of Twitter's and Youtube's decision to remove the footage. (Interestingly, note that the quotes in favor of censoring the images all came from average users, while the arguments against censoring the content, were quotations from respected journalism experts.) In addition to agreeing more with the anti-censorship arguments, I've also felt that for a news organization to tell their readers, "We have elected not to publish the link," smacks of elitism -- because certainly they feel that they are entitled to view the video in the course of their research. If a group of journalists in a news office were working together to find the video online, and one of them announced to the room, "Well, I've found the link, but I've made a decision not to share it with the rest of you," they would rightly be fired. But when the same journalists announce they're not going to share the link with the rest of us, that's considered an ethics call.

But that's in a simple binary choice between publishing and not publishing the content. Suppose you had the option of posting the video, preceded by a (non-skippable) message exhorting users to donate to the Red Cross, or some other organization that was either fighting ISIS directly, or mitigating the damage they're doing? (And then if users post links to the video at any other source, then rather than suspending those users' accounts or removing the content outright, Twitter and Youtube could mandate that users link instead to the PSA-prepended version.)

If this sounds idiotic at first, I'm not suggesting just taking the average banal Red Cross PSA and splicing it in at the beginning, followed by the execution video. The Red Cross could (hastily) record an announcement specifically addressing the situation, reminding people of the similar brutalities that are being committed every day, and the need for support and help. Attempting to secure permission from the victim's family would be a good idea too. To avoid accusations that the Red Cross was attempting to "profit" from the tragedy, any funds raised via a direct prompt in the ad (such as as 5-digit number that you can text to make a donation) would have to go into an account earmarked strictly to be used only for aid to victims, not for Red Cross employees' salaries or for any other purpose whatsoever.

Of course, no matter how many times you emphasize that funds being raised are absolutely being used only to help victims, some viewers will react with disgust at the idea of the video pre-mercial being used for "fundraising". But while it would be very tricky to get the message right in practice, I don't think I would object in principle to a pre-pended message in front of the video, that either raised funds for humanitarian aid, or otherwise counteracted the goals of the terrorists.

So if Youtube allows the video to be posted along with a pre-pended PSA, this trivially achieves the goal of "making the information available to the public"; does it also prevent the dissemination of the video from helping ISIS, and does it reduce the incentive for terrorists to release similar videos in the future? Or to put it precisely, (1) does releasing the video this way, sufficiently undermine the goals of ISIS? and (2) would ISIS perceive that their goals are undermined if we release the video this way?

Unfortunately, when the goal of an organization is to spread terror, then humanitarian aid to their victims may not undermine their goal as much as we might hope, because the point of launching a newsworthy terror attack is usually not to harm the victims directly but to terrorize the rest of the population. If the original victims are rescued and nursed back to health after the cameras have stopped rolling, that doesn't neutralize the intimidating effect on everyone else.

But perhaps that just means that the Red Cross is not the right organization to benefit from a PSA posted at the beginning of the video. If we want to make sure ISIS is harmed every time someone watches the video -- and more importantly, that ISIS knows it is being harmed every time someone watches the video -- then maybe it should be pre-pended with a message exhorting people to sign up for training with the armed services, to help wipe ISIS off the face of the Earth.

Yes, that would elicit howls of protest from some people who might not have objected to the Red Cross PSA, but the goal should not be to favor some cuddly organization that is the least controversial to everybody. The goal should be to punish ISIS to the maximum extent with every additional viewing of the video, in order to reduce the chances that ISIS, or anyone else, would release a video like that again. What is the one thing that ISIS would least want people to see before watching their gruesome propaganda clip? If the answer is, "A message urging people to join the military and fight against ISIS," then that's what should be put in front of the video.

It all still sounds like quite a bizarre idea, to me as well, but the fact remains that if we're going to support making the video available at all, this seems like the way to do it that would harm ISIS instead of benefiting them. Perhaps someone else can think of a better way. (On the other hand, to people who think the video should be suppressed, it's all a moot point anyway.)

13 of 300 comments (clear)

  1. I forced myself to watch it by geek · · Score: 5, Insightful

    As far as I am concerned, no one should comment on it unless they've seen it. The arm chair quarterbacks who are removed from the issue and not exposed to it should shut the hell up.

    The video is horrifying and Youtube and other services removing it is an injustice to humanity. People should see this and remember it. Just as people should see the horrors of the holocaust and remember. All removing the content does is ensure people are ignorant to the truth. Look how well banning Nazi memorabilia has worked out in France where they now have a HUGE uptick in the amount of anti-semitism.

    Hiding the unpleasantness in life does not make it go away.

    1. Re:I forced myself to watch it by i+kan+reed · · Score: 4, Insightful

      But I can tell from your attitude, you'll be outraged the moment trolls start posting the video with humorous audio editing.

      And if you allow the video, that's exactly what will happen. Respect for the dead starts with not spreading their demise to every curious onlooker.

    2. Re:I forced myself to watch it by sycodon · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Could it be the HUGE uptick in the amount of anti-semitism is the result of the immigration of a HUGE number Islamic radicals?

      --
      When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
    3. Re:I forced myself to watch it by Njorthbiatr · · Score: 5, Interesting

      The dead are dead, the respect is for the living who believe in the ridiculous notion of respect for the dead. Censorship is wrong, and more important in this case, completely ineffective. So ISIS is going to stop beheading people because they can't upload it to youtube? Please, please don't make me laugh. The only thing that's sickening are people who are crying to censor it. Censor whatever you want, it doesn't stop atrocities from happening. It's disgusting that some people are in so much denial they feel the need to force it upon other people. You don't stop this by running away like a coward and being all hushed. Freakin' ridiculous.

  2. There is no public benefit by i+kan+reed · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Snuff films don't educate. We're all becoming a bit more desensitized to this kind of thing thanks to the internet, but there isn't actually anything to be learned from watching a man die.

    It's against youtube's TOS(because they run a content censored site) and so they take it down. I don't tend to endorse censorship, but classes of censorship that the distributor is reasonably upfront about, and has a reasonable basis, I just can't muster that righteous anger the summary is exhorting.

    1. Re:There is no public benefit by timrod · · Score: 5, Informative

      First off, I think we should put PSAs over Bennett's stories. It might give people a reason to click them, especially if Dice donated some small amount of money to whatever charity group has the PSA out.

      That said, "snuff" videos do educate people. One of the most famous (which was circulating as "Faces of Death: Senator Suicide" on Kazaa back when I was in middle school and was the talk of all of the kids on the bus) is Budd Dwyer's suicide by self-inflicted gunshot, which was recorded by a bunch of TV news crews who had come expecting him to resign from his position as a state senator after he was charged with corruption. Instead, they watched as this guy read a statement and then pulled a gun out of a manila envelope. If you watch the tapes - the unedited ones - you can hear people in the background pleading with him to drop the gun, because at the time they thought he was going to shoot at them. Then, he turns the gun on himself, while TV cameras are capturing the entire event.

      The professor of one of my first college classes (I was a journalism major and don't regret it even though I can't find a job) started his class off with that video - and I think I was the only person in the room other than him who knew what was going to happen. The footage is horrifying, but it proves a point in that you can never go into a story expecting anything, and what happens if something like this occurs. Many of the media outlets that recorded Dwyer's suicide refused to show any of the footage at all, even before he pulled the gun out. Others showed it right up until the gun came out - I think one went so far as to show the manila envelope that had the gun in it but not the gun itself.

      I learned two valuable things that day - the first that you can never take a story for granted. No one who was there that day thought it was going to be anything more than a minor politician reading off a prepared statement, and were only there to get perhaps 5 seconds of footage - Dwyer saying that he would be stepping down as a state senator. Instead, they wound up with a national-level story on their hands and one of the most well-known ethical dilemmas of journalism. The second was never to trust a manila envelope. Those things are nothing but trouble.

  3. Red Cross is non-political by Njovich · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The Red Cross is non-political for a reason.

    If they pick a side they will endanger countless of workers from the Red Cross. The goal of the Red Cross is to provide humanitarian aid and emergency relief.

    ISIS may be a bunch of evil maniacs, but let the judging be done by other organisations that don't have to help civilians in the frontlines.

  4. If by "decreeses" you mean "increases", then yes by Zero__Kelvin · · Score: 4, Insightful

    "but it also reduces the public's access to information"

    A) What information does it supposedly reduce? I'm pretty sure you can tell me that something happened without showing me a video. Did you know that there was a 3 car pileup on route 3? Why no I don't because I haven't seen a video of it!

    B) Removing the video caused the information to proliferate more due to the Streisand Effect. I literally hadn't heard about the incident until all the fuss was raised about the removal of the video.

    --
    Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
  5. Human Dignity Matters by jaeztheangel · · Score: 5, Insightful

    There are plenty of angry young idiots who will exult in it - let's not give them the pleasure.

  6. No by jmhysong · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I don't want to see it, I wouldn't want any kid of mine to see it, and the thought of gore groupies getting a kick out of it sickens me. Also, if it was a family member of mine who was beheaded, I'd be furious at anyone who posted the video.

    I know what the word beheaded means, I don't need to see it.

  7. Really? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    No, no, hell no. There's nothing ethical about using the beheading of a person as a fund raising tool. What the hell is wrong with you...

  8. Oh please by sunking2 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The real question is why do we live in a society that thinks they need actually see this as opposed to reading. I didn't need to to go search out the video to understand the significance of what happened. I think the fact we live in a society that seems to "need" to see such is very telling. Whether you've seen it or not changes none of the facts, and in no way should influence how you feel about such matters.

  9. Because of _censorship_ by UnknownSoldier · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Hiding the truth is not the solution -- it is the _problem_.

    Many geeks care about censorship.