It’s unusual for law enforcement agencies to release video footage of police shootings so quickly. Doing so, FBI officials hoped, would dispel rumors about Finicum’s death. Instead, the debate grew louder.
Source: Oregon standoff: Video of LaVoy Finicum’s death fuels rampant rumors, debate
This particular story from The Oregonian, covering the shooting death of one of the best-known Malheur occupation leaders, appeared yesterday and received nearly 3500 comments as of now. Many of them come from seasoned comment veterans; many are back-and-forths that sound as if the commenters know each other (at least their online presence). None of this large volume of comments could credibly be viewed as representative of public opinion. Much is hearsay. A great deal reveals strong bias.
Yet perhaps these are the reasons we should read online comments, because the ideas they present (or dispute) are the ideas that are out there right now, the ugly unadorned ideas that get to the gut of popular theory. There is considerable noise in this signal: the conversation threads wander and are filled with non sequiturs. But passionate ideas, whether moving or distasteful, move people.
This was a sad (though, many would argue, deserved) ending to Finicum’s life, and the commentary on it is by and large insensitive. Yet it connects quite directly to the larger debate around the Malheur occupation, which raises important environmental questions. Doing environmental theory may sometimes mean listening to people with whom we may strongly disagree, expressing their ideas in ways we find offensive, so that we can understand ourselves—and, yes, possibly our enemy—in a deeper way.
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