Two unprecedented incidents during the last week costing ten youth lives, two police lives, and causing life-changing injuries to four others, throw the spotlight once again on social media.
First, five teenagers died and four other people were seriously injured in a crash involving a car driving in the wrong direction on a motorway in County Kildare, Ireland. The balaclava-clad youths killed were joyriding, filming their antics for TikTok ‘likes', when they collided, head-on, with three sisters in their twenties and thirties, and a seven-year-old boy, the son of one, en route to the airport, at 3 am. The injuries to these four innocents are believed to be ‘life-changing.’ All five youths were suspects in recent thefts, burglaries and anti-social activities across Kildare and Carlow, and were known to have posted their escapades on social media, being among increasing numbers of youths trying to outdo each other in dangerous videos posted to social media. They were reported as having terrorised communities for weeks, not caring if they were caught. County Kildare Police Commissioner Justin Kelly, commenting on the circumstances of that particular tragedy, said, “What makes this reckless behaviour even more appalling is that in some cases it is being done for social media likes, regardless of the potentially devastating impact it might have on innocent people and themselves.”
Then, this week in Middlesbrough, in the North East of the UK, only days later, also during the small hours, five more young men in a stolen vehicle, on a crime spree, evaded pursuing police by escaping down a dual carriageway ramp, then slammed head-on into an oncoming police vehicle, killing two police officers. But they did not go home from work that night, and two more families are left bereft, mourning.
Among the young people who perished were, again, frequent social media contributors, posting and boasting of their stealing vehicles, burglaries and other ‘anti-social’ activities, several having appeared in court or having come to the attention of social services. Residents, while expressing their sympathy for the young men’s parents, have echoed frustration that neither their families nor the courts have been able to stop their endless ‘madness,’ of community and social disruption, and criminal activities.
And first, what about their families? How on earth does a family become so dysfunctional that mum and dad don’t know where their teenage son is and what he’s doing late at night? Where is the love; the concern; the parenting? If a teenager is going out late at night with dubious ‘mates,’ and getting up to no good, did they know? Did they care? Did they question? Did they try? These aren’t palatable questions, and among grieving families will be unwelcome, for sure, but they will certainly ask them of themselves, unspoken... the unspoken answers are either a compassionate release, or an indomitable burden.
And the question we must all be asking is this: If these young people were so open to being so naïve, putting themselves at such risk, and in such danger, of compromising their futures, and of hurting those closest to them... for a few likes. Yes, likes, not love; likes, the most casual of sentiments akin to Bob Dylan’s ‘love watered down,’ or as Zack Rubin said, “Like has the characteristic of affection, but love, those of care, attachment and intimacy,” such as in family. So, where was the love that should have nurtured and sustained them, kept them safe and sound, and brought them home in the dark of night? And then, should TikTok not be held to account, having given a platform to the prevalence of these activities, and by doing so, encouraging further such ‘deeds.’ Surely, encouraging criminal activities as such is promoting antagonism between them and the police. Is this their objective? Using youth ego and desire for ‘fame,’ social media is societal neglect, isn’t it? In fact, it’s madness that TikTok, for all their role in these tragedies, emerges unscathed in the face of their creative irresponsibility.
Ray Petersen
The writer is a media consultant.
Email: r.j.petersen52@gmail.com
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