A Different View
Overuse of cameras just another modern day menace
A Different View with Dave O’Connell
If a wild man with blood on his hands and a knife and machete in his fist came up to you and asked you to film him on your camera phone, you’d imagine your first instinct would be to turn on your heels and run as fast and as far as you could in the opposite direction.
But apparently you’d be wrong.
Because such is our insatiable appetite to capture all moments and images that we’d risk our own lives to film the bloody end of someone else’s.
The most bizarre thing about that horrific murder in Woolwich recently wasn’t that two lunatics attacked and killed an unsuspecting, off-duty soldier – it was that dozens of people filmed the aftermath with no more fear than they would have had if they’d come across a car that had run over a cat.
They were circling around like a lingering audience after coming out of a theatre, instead of a group that had witnessed what was, by any stretch, a deadly drama.
Some very courageous citizens among them stood over the murder victim’s body in open defiance of his killers, and they deserve every commendation the British can muster for their bravery.
But those who mooched around with their mobile phones have clearly watched too much television and must have felt like they’d been given a walk-on part in a new series called CSI: London.
The image of a man ranting into a camera phone about Muslims and war, with his beheaded victim clearly visible on the street behind him isn’t just deeply disturbing – it is a final commentary on where we find ourselves in this age of technology and instant news.
But then again, should we really be surprised that people will unwittingly risk their own lives so they’ll have something to show their friends later – or something to flog to television or the tabloids of thirty pieces of silver.
More and more, American television relies on what is euphemistically called ‘citizen journalism’ – which is where individuals with cameras or video recorders roam the streets in search of a crime, a crash or a dead body.
From a positive point of view, were it not for ‘citizen journalism’, we’d have known little of the Arab Spring or Syrian uprising; the civil resistance in Bahrain would never have been heard of outside of the Persian Gulf.
Indeed there are agencies – our own Mark Little’s Storyful, for example – which have been set up for the specific purpose of distilling such footage and verifying its provenance, to bring it to a worldwide audience.
And all of that is very positive – a chance for ordinary people to play their part outside of ‘traditional media’ who either couldn’t be there in time to capture a moment or who, in the case of some US networks, may prefer to ignore it.
But it’s when this becomes little more than voyeurism that the waters turn considerably more muddy.
And you’d have to wrack your brains to imagine a scenario, anytime, anywhere, that there isn’t some galoot with a camera recording it for posterity.
You only have to see a performing puppy standing on its hind legs and half a dozen people have their phones out to take a picture, never thinking for a second that even they themselves wouldn’t want to look at the image at any point over the rest of their lives, let alone show it to their guests at a future dinner party.
If you’re unlucky enough to be seated towards the back of a concert, you’ll spend more of the night watching the band through someone else’s camera or mobile because where once it was a sea of cigarette lighters illuminating the arena, it’s now a wall of phones lighting up the night.
At the end of the day, is the world really a better place because we’ve filmed every minute of every day?
And anyway, if we keep recording it all of the time…..when will we have time to actually watch it?
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
A Different View with Dave O’Connell
The only time in your life that you should ever utter the words: “Do you know who I am?” are if you’ve just had a bang on the head or you are unfortunately suffering from dementia.
Because, otherwise, the phrase ‘do you know who I am’ only serves to make things a whole lot worse.
Normally, the phrase is unleashed towards late night door staff on a wave of alcohol – and never once in the history of time has it produced the result the utterer had intended.
The doorman may well know who you are which is often the very reason you’re not getting into the place in the first instance – or if he doesn’t know who you are, he won’t be unduly influenced when he does, unless you’re a famous movie star or his long-lost cousin.
‘Do you know where I am?’ might often be closer to the phrase you’re looking for, because that would serve you well when you’re looking for a taxi.
‘Do you know who I am?’ is a threatening phrase that in truth wouldn’t frighten the cat. But if you’re anxious to dig the hole a few shovels deeper, you should follow up with ‘I’d like to speak to your manager.’
Managers can be elusive at the best of times, but they’re normally rarer than hen’s teeth when it comes to the small hours of the morning – and even if they’re there, they are most likely watching proceedings on CCTV…just so they know who you are, in case you yourself can’t remember.
‘I’d like to speak to your manager’ suggests that you and he or she are from the one social sphere which is several strata north of the one occupied by door staff.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
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A Different View with Dave O’Connell
As it turned out, we were much closer to a Eurovision win than we could ever have imagined – not Ireland, of course, because we’ve now mastered the art of just sending cannon fodder to be blown out in the semi-final.
No, this was just two of us – myself and our eldest – who were lucky enough to be at Anfield for the Reds’ recent win over Brentford, where positioned in the seat right in front of us were four happy lads from Finland.
One of them, we now know, was Käärijä, the singer of the catchiest song at Eurovision, Cha Cha Cha.
But just a week before 7,000 people sung his catchphrase at the Eurovision Arena, he and two his mates – accompanied by an older bloke who had to be either his dad or from the national broadcaster – sat anonymously in the same corner of the lower level of Anfield’s Main Stand.
He was utterly unknown to us as well of course, and the only thing that saw him stand out was his green nail varnish. Live and let live, of course, but it still ensures that you make an impression even if it looks like you were just very late for St Patrick’s Day.
Käärijä may well be Liverpool’s greatest Scandinavian fan, although the bar for that is set fairly high, given that they invade the city in greater numbers every two weeks than the Vikings did just once during the first millennium.
Equally, he may not be a football fan at all – although, as the rest of the week proved, he sure loves a crowd.
Positioned as we were in the corner of the Main Stand, the next section to us, around the corner in the Anfield Road Stand – currently adding a top layer – was occupied by the visiting Brentford supporters.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App
Download the Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App to access to Galway’s best-selling newspaper.
Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
Or purchase the Digital Edition for PC, Mac or Laptop from Pagesuite HERE.
Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
A Different View with Dave O’Connell
Contactless payments reached a record €17.9 billion in Ireland last year – up by 31 per cent on 2021, as people came out from under their Covid shell and appear to have left their cash behind them.
Figures from the Banking & Payments Federation found that – despite the cost-of-living increases – the Irish public made three million contactless payments a day, worth an average of €53 million in the final quarter of 2022.
Given that there are 3.8 million people in Ireland over the age of 18, that means that almost every single one of us tapped the card every day last year.
And again, on the presumption that there are a few who still prefer peeling a fifty off a wad of notes, the true figure may be even higher, as we eschew actual money every time we go into a restaurant, bar or shop.
Then comes the monthly morning of reckoning when you open your statement – electronic of course because, like paper money, banks don’t deal in paper statements anymore either – and your guilty secrets unfurl like a rap sheet before your very eyes.
Five taps of a Friday night in the local, followed by a five-ounce burger meal on the way home.
And just why did you need a family-pack of crisps when a small bag would have done? Was all that beer and wine really for a party, or a night in just for one?
Cash provided plenty of dark corners to ignore your profligacy, but there are no hiding places in the contactless world.
Worse still, until that morning of reckoning arrives, you’ve no clue how much you’ve spent, and handing over the card doesn’t hurt half as much as parting with hard cash.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App
Download the Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App to access to Galway’s best-selling newspaper.
Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
Or purchase the Digital Edition for PC, Mac or Laptop from Pagesuite HERE.
Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
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