Social media made avoiding videos of shooting difficult

Just minutes after Charlie Kirk had been shot in Utah, video of his death was not only easy to find, but for many, unavoidable to watch.

- ANDREW GRIFFIN TECHNOLOGY EDITOR

Footage of the shooting was immediately posted to platforms including X, formerly known as Twitter, and Meta’s Instagram. And because of the feed-based nature of these platforms - where users do not pick what they see next - many were forced to watch a disturbing video without either warning or choice.

Traditional news organisations were cautious in their mid-afternoon coverage of Kirk’s assassination on Wednesday: they chose not to depict the moment he was shot, instead showing video of him tossing hats to his audience moments before, and panicked onlookers scattering wildly in the moments after.

In practical terms, though, it mattered little. Explicit footage of the shooting was available almost instantly online, from several angles, even in slow motion. Millions of people watched.

The footage was easy to find on X, Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, YouTube - even on Truth Social, where US president Donald Trump posted official word of the conservative activist’s death.

These platforms aim to keep readers engaged with a constant flow of new content, ostensibly tailored to their interests but ultimately not giving them a choice about seeing any given post. In addition, videos will autoplay as users scroll - meaning that people were shown graphic and brutal footage without a chance to prepare themselves.

On X, a number of posts seemed to reference directly the impossibility of avoiding the video. In the wake of the attack, numerous people posted that they were logging off - really the only way to avoid seeing the footage.