Tasteless selfie: "village idiots". Why smiling about a tragedy?

[marylander1940]

Tasteless selfie: "village idiots". Why smiling about a tragedy?

 

There's a time and place to take selfies — concerts, sporting events, red carpets, space. The still-smoldering site of a deadly building explosion is not one of them.

 

A little more than 24 hours after an apparent gas explosion in New York City's East Village destroyed three buildings, injured 22 people and left two others missing, a group of smiling women were seen using a selfie stick to take a group photo with the blast site as a backdrop.

 

The tasteless photo op, captured by a passing New York City event photographer Friday night, was posted on an East Village blog — drawing immediate outrage.

 

http://rack.1.mshcdn.com/media/ZgkyMDE1LzAzLzI5LzY3L3NlbGZpZXN0aWNrLjg3NGIxLmpwZwpwCXRodW1iCTEyMDB4NjI3IwplCWpwZw/b801d750/cc4/selfiestick1.jpg

 

http://news.yahoo.com/selfie-stick-east-village-explosion-site-nyc-182256693.html

 

Another tasteless selfie.

 

[rvwnsd]

I suppose this is "selfie-absorption."

[+ FreshFluff]

Was anyone else there or around that area at the time? I live on a high floor nearby, and the smell of smoke was awful. After calling 911 (as I hadn't heard sirens), I and several others went to see what was going on. From a block-and-a-half away, we watched the FDNY battle the fire.

 

Two people were missing afterwards, and two bodies have now been found in the rubble. One worked at the sushi restaurant on the ground floor, and the other was on a date there. The brother of the second missing guy was watching the recovery efforts. The NY Post reported that when the first body was found, the brother called up his father and said something like "Don't worry, it's not him. I'll bring it him home to you." The body was later identified as his brother. It's hard to get that out of my mind.

 

I'm probably an outlier, but the selfies don't bother me much. All the respect and mourning in the world won't bring back those two men and can't take away the intense grief of those two families. If anything offends me, it's the Post heartlessly reporting the content of that overheard phone conversation.

[+ purplekow]

"Oh look, a building blew up. Quick girls gather around time for a Selfie. Okay everyone say Blaze" Idiots. Self Absorbed. 7 of them and not a functioning neuron in the bunch.

[Guest countryboywny]

"Oh look, a building blew up. Quick girls gather around time for a Selfie. Okay everyone say Blaze" Idiots. Self Absorbed. 7 of them and not a functioning neuron in the bunch.

 

I see this behavior all too often. Some people are so self absorbed that they lack common courtesy and empathy for the fate of others. It's a product of our social culture these days, people are getting away with things like this because they can.

[+ quoththeraven]

I don't know what to think. Were they consciously using this tragedy as a backdrop, or were they a bunch of friends who happened to be in that location when they took a selfie to commemorate the occasion? It was stupid, but we don't know enough to know if this was a conscious decision or if all they are guilty of is facing the wrong way (i.e., with the fire behind them) when the photo was taken.

[loverboy95]

The fact that people could do this makes me sick.

[bigvalboy]

Part of me wants to lecture them, but then the other part hears Ron White..."You can't fix stupid, stupid is forever" ...moving on.

[marylander1940]

Part of me wants to lecture them, but then the other part hears Ron White..."You can't fix stupid, stupid is forever" ...moving on.

 

At least she apologized... and she also went to college, she can't be that stupid. LOL

 

A woman who posed for a photo smiling and flashing a peace sign in front of the site of last week’s deadly explosion in the East Village has apologized.

 

“It was inconsiderate to those hurt in the crash and to the city of New York,” the woman, Christina Freundlich, wrote in an email to the Des Moines Register. “What happened last week in the East Village is not to be taken lightly, and I regret my course of action.”

 

Freundlich, a former communications director for the Iowa Democratic Party, posted the photo to her Instagram account on Friday, a day after the blast leveled three buildings and left 22 people injured and two missing. Freundlich’s caption: “Scene of the accident.” The image quickly drew outrage.

 

“WTF is wrong with you?” read a comment on Freundlich’s post.

 

“I can only imagine how the families of those two missing people must feel right now,” another comment read. “You are heartless.”

 

Freundlich later deleted the image.

 

On Sunday, authorities said two bodies discovered amid the rubble are believed to be those of the missing men: 26-year-old Moises Lucon, who worked at a ground-floor sushi restaurant; and 23-year-old Nicholas Figueroa, a bowling alley worker who had been there on a date.

 

In her email, Freundlich said she was “deeply sorry for my careless and distasteful post.”

 

http://news.yahoo.com/selfie-east-village-explosion-woman-iowa-apology-130442067.html

[Boink]

Never have and never will understand the phenom known as 'social media'. I'm glad it wasn't around during 9/11.

[marylander1940]

Never have and never will understand the phenom known as 'social media'. I'm glad it wasn't around during 9/11.