Two years ago my family moved from Ealing, London, to a tiny village in Northumberland on the edge of Rothbury.
I continue to work in London and travel back and forth splitting my time between the two locations. It’s a hellish commute but the benefits of raising a young family in a tranquil rural location with a strong community and extended family nearby are immeasurable.
But since Tuesday that tranquillity has been destroyed and Rothbury has become the focus of a massive media story as the police search for Raoul Moat.
It’s almost inconceivable that one of the remotest locations in England could be at the heart of such a media spotlight. Last night as I drove through Rothbury on my way home there were six TV crews in the centre of the village and a number of hacks milling around.
I’ve done a couple of phone interviews this morning as a ‘media expert’ on the reporting of the Rothbury story. The questions in each case have been similar. Is media reporting disproportionate to the story and shouldn’t the police be providing minute-by-minute updates? It’s difficult to say, given the sensitivity of the situation.
The Rothbury story, like all stories that hit the national news agenda, is expanding to fill the available space. Many of Rothbury’s 1,700-strong population have been pulled aside to comment.
Local residents have received regular voicemail updates from Northumbria police and last night it held a public meeting for media and people in Rothbury to discuss the ongoing situation. It’s an extemporary approach to crisis communications.
But inevitably it’s not possible for the police to answer every question.
What has been surprising has been the nonsense on social networks. Twitter has spawned a genre of Moat gags, minute-by-minute updates speculate his movements and the population of Rothbury is the butt of idle comment.
Facebook has a Raoul Moat group page (update 12 July: page now removed) with nearly 17,000 members, which despite the best intention of its moderator has become a fan site for Moat.
These sorts of conversations have always taken place around big news events of course. But now social networks enable us to document and share them with little thought to decency, defamation or plain commonsense for the sensitivities of the ongoing investigation.
It’s irresponsible. The Rothbury story shows the need for trained journalists and editors and not digital rubber necking.
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Stephen Waddington. Stephen Waddington said: Reporting from Rothbury: social media goes feral http://bit.ly/aoMd6e #rothbury #nefollowers #raoulmoat [...]
Isn’t it not just British culture to take the piss when faced with incredibly dangerous and or emotional news? I don’t think that social media can be blamed for insensitive comment, and it certainly isn’t victimising the good people of Rothbury. All it is doing is amplifying what you would hear down the pub if you were chatting about the situation with your mates, the odd sly comment and the hushed snigger.
I suppose the only difference is that people are trying to out-do each other with ‘witty’ comments on a larger scale than they would if they were sat around a table or stood around a bar.
Just British banter, nothing more sinister and nothing more serious than that.
I agree with John but I can see where Steve is coming from.
I grew up near Rothbury, Dr Thomlinson’s was my middle school and my family still live in the area. The jokes are inappropriate. But the “you can’t say that” factor and the timing is what makes them funny. I haven’t seen any jokes directed at Rothbury as a place yet, they may have passed me by.
There are competing theories about jokes (for a entertaining non-academic overview have a look a Jimmy Carr’s book the Naked Jape) and none fully explain joke telling and what makes something funny. One of them is the idea of the joke as a release valve in socially awkward situations. I think that fits here.
In nearly every tragic accident or state of emergency you can count the seconds down to receiving a text, tweet or facebook update with joke about it. For me it took 23 minutes from when the missing car was reported on the news. Not surprisingly, it came from one of my old mates who works in Rothbury.
I laughed but then felt guilty. Humour can be a complicated matter.
If social media is word of mouth on steroids then the same principles must apply to jokes made on social networks, even if in poor taste. They are shared and amplified in real time and people will naturally try to push the boundaries of what is acceptable in order to come up with a new one-liner.
As for the more serious comments and speculation, if there is an information black hole people will look to fill it in any means possible. I would argue this applies to old and new media. No its not helpful but the police will (hopefully) have more information than they are letting on.
Managing the information and message to the suspect through the media is an important part of policing often under the advice of a criminal psychologist. If it helps catch him quicker then a bit of useless chatter and withheld information is a price worth paying.