Police brutality has been a hot topic recently and been shown a lot more through the use of social media. Police brutality has always existed, but in 2015 it is widely broadcast. Many users on social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook tend to share or post their experience with the police even if the police are just doing their jobs. Recent deaths in America and this country of public citizens murdered by the police and the police getting away with it have them public enemy. The police are always spoke in a derogatory way on these social networking sites and are never in favour of what they are doing.
Firstly the Sandra Bland video went viral on social media and everyone within a day knew about her death and the story behind it. The death was filmed by the police car's cctv and shows her getting beaten and across all social media the popular opinion was disgust however in the guardian it was a similar story trying raise awareness for the case and stating the facts and the allegations of her being dead when photographed.
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jul/29/sandra-bland-police-custody-deaths
This is in contrast to a lot of racial police brutality cases. For example the Mark Duggan case, the media cropped the picture of him holding some flowers next to his child's grave to make him seem more like a thug. This was to make it seem as if his death was justifiable because he is a thug or looked like one therefore the police officer had a right to act on suspicion but personally I don't think that is the case. No death can be justified he simply was shot because of his race some may argue.
http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/mar/24/mark-duggan-shooting-police-watchdog-clears-officers-wrongdoing
In this article it justifies the death of Mark and explains to the public why he was shot. This was a very controversial time in London as the death of him sparked riots therefore the media needed to be careful in what they said as no one wanted another riot. The media presented the killing as wrong but was justifiable and made it out to have been an accident. The trial's final conclusion was that the police officer was innocent. But as you can see in the two articles one is for and one is against. Racial police brutality always has been and always will be a sensitive subject and the media need to be careful as to what they say but its hard to get it completely right. On the other hand on social media the voice of people still remains to have hatred towards the police and popular opinion is that the police are only targeting ethnic minorities and referencing the police to a modern 'KKK' which sparks controversy. The media often refer to the authorities with their best interest as everything is filtered therefore the government have control of what goes out. If an article reflects the authorities negatively it wouldn't be released as they wouldn't want the public to view then in a derogatory way. Therefore every article is biased.
Final case is the Ferguson and Michael Brown's death.The innocent young man was walking with a hoody up when the police shot him. This is perfect example of the police stereotyping ethnic minorities. This also went viral which just made america have no faith in the police anymore.
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/08/13/us/ferguson-missouri-town-under-siege-after-police-shooting.html?_r=0
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