We were astonished and humbled this past week by the power of journalism, which has been intensified and accelerated by the internet and the interactivity of social media. Two incidents reminded us how very connected we all are and how immediately we can reach our community now – for better and worse.
On Thursday our photojournalist, Wiley Price, took a cue from the police scanner and responded to a knifing in front of the Central Library downtown. He was on the scene to photograph what may have been the dying victim’s last, bloody gasp. As any photojournalist would, Wiley took pride in capturing news – even the worst of news – as it happened, then rushed back to the newsroom to edit and file his photograph. Our internet and social media staff posted it to stlamerican.com and to our Facebook page where it immediately began to inspire a conversation that spread quickly to other people’s pages.
A loved one of the by now dead man – who was killed while protecting a friend from an assailant – saw the photograph on our Facebook page before she knew of the incident. Deeply grieved and outraged, she called to complain in tones that caused our receptionist to call the police, though we took down the image from our website and Facebook page without further incident. We believe Wiley was correct in reporting the news, and we published his photograph as a graphic reminder of the violent crime that plagues our community. The comment thread the image immediately provoked was a needed conversation about the violence that surrounds us and our need to address it proactively. But in the end, as a community institution, we respected the wishes of the distraught family, silenced this conversation, and offer the family our deepest condolences.
The next day, our web editor and arts reporter Kenya Vaughn responded to an inside tip that Tony Scott, the engaging and beloved radio personality on Majic 100.3 FM, had been dismissed after more than 25 years. She confirmed the dismissal and posted a brief, 157-word news report on stlamerican.com that she promoted on Facebook and Twitter. At press time for this print edition, Kenya’s brief report was one of the most-read stories ever posted on our website or Facebook page. On Facebook alone it received 485 Shares (that is, re-posts to personal pages), 277 Likes (by people grateful to receive the news, even though it was bad news) and 168 comments by people who had something to say about it. More than 88,000 people saw her report through Facebook alone.
These two events show that The St. Louis American, formerly limited to a weekly newspaper, truly has entered the 21st century of ever-present digital media. Eight years ago, our community would have waited nearly a week to hear from us about Tony Scott’s dismissal. Now they were hearing about it in real time while the man was still cleaning out his office. It’s also true that five years ago no one would have seen the image of the knifed Good Samaritan. As a positive community newspaper, we seldom publish graphic crime photos in our print edition. The internet and social media, we feel, are more acceptable places to share this deeply disturbing but important news with our community.
However, this latest tragic incident has provoked a new round of soul-searching in our newsroom about the appropriateness of publishing an image of anyone’s loved one who may be on the brink of death. We’re only the messenger, but we’re not sure whether we should ever be the messenger of death. We encourage our community to tell us how you feel about this important question – and we thank you for staying so strongly connected to us.