Nerve Endings Firing Away

By now almost everyone in the nation has seen clips of videos and many pictures that Cho Seung-hui mailed to NBC before heading out to his second round of killing. He may have been a lonely and troubled individual seen as most by crazy but in one swoop he achieved instant fame posthumously. He isn’t around to see his pictures posing with deadly weapons being published in virtually every publication of note around America and probably around the world. In addition, plenty of blogs have posted his pictures too.

The images are larger than any of the victims he mercilessly killed. Murmurs of protest are already emerging from Blackburg and asking questions whether NBC was right in airing the video and showing the pictures of their worst nightmare. Dave Winer believes that NBC should release the full video and considers it wrong of NBC to hold on to them. Doc Searls puts it more gently and says that there may be more consequences to holding on to the content than to releasing it. Given that we live in a viral Web 2.0 world, it doesn’t take long for any content be it text, images or video to get around and those protesting against the release cite the fear of copycat murders being motivated and seeking similar infamy.

I can imagine that NBC must have thought long and hard about this decision and although the windfall of getting such content must have been good for their bottomline, their decision to inundate the grieving viewers with such graphic content would have been foolhardy and lead to a public relations disaster.

America holds the principle of free speech close to its heart and has fiercely protected this right although certain speech like the recent Don Imus outburst has tested the limits. Regarding the Cho Seung-hui video, his rights to an audience aren’t in question but in fact, the need for the people to understand the deviant psyche that motivated him to act this way is. Would be better informed or learn something from these videos and images? Perhaps. We may hear his words and attempt to understand his emotions and if it weren’t for his heinous actions, some may even sympathize.

But that is exactly what the people who oppose do not want. A student in California who hinted that he sympathized with Cho Seung-hui got into trouble with the school authorities. I completely understand that the nation is on the edge and inspite of the overwhelming feeling of common sorrow, there is a latent feeling of suspicion and fear against the people around you; especially so if they happen to be of a different ethnic background. The messages of a killer are always chilling and although may appear rational on the face of it, the emotional affect on the survivors can be devastating. Imagine the plight of the girl who was among the four in a class of 30 who survived having to see the face of the killer in self-aggrandizing pomposity and emotions of victimization. Can she see any reason in the words of an individual who gunned down her colleagues in cold blood?

That said, I am not sure I would support censoring his videos but the question arises who would be responsible for what we should see and what we shouldn’t? NBC? The federal authorities? Virginia Tech? The survivors? If Cho Seung-hui had chosen to upload the video on YouTube before he went on his killing spree, then the onus would have been on YouTube. Like it or not, we are now a voyueristic culture that cannot resist the temptation of a raunchy school kids MMS or the Saddam hanging. And frankly, there is no telling what effect any images might have on any of us. There just might be an animal hidden in one of us that is waiting to be unleashed. If it isn’t this video, then probably it will be some other.