I read that as “the Rodney King story” being the story in the traditional news or later documentary format. Without the social media explosion, the situation might not have got the attention it needed meaning the story fizzled out (or, more cynically, the police would have been able to control the narrative long enough for the general public not to pay attention because something else was happened elsewhere to take over the news coverage).
Rodney King was before my time, but the main Rodney King riots happened after the cops involved were acquitted, right? The main difference does have a little to do with social media, in that the George Floyd death video could be reshared in real time. The main reasons BLM took off in 2020 is that it had already taken off in 2014 and, importantly, most people were in COVID lockdown for 2 months by that point and had become a little stir-crazy.
To be honest, I was completely mixing up the timeline of police attrocities against minorities and other communities/individuals. I'm not sure if that says more about the number of those matters making the is a lot to remember, or about my own privilege of being so far removed from most of it that I don't need to keep track in any detail.
Right -- I'm a little older than many, but to explain:
When the Rodney King thing happened, black folks like myself were like "Finally, the world will see how horrible the cops can be. We will have a trial and get justice."
That didn't remotely happen. It's not until social media that we got e.g. BLM and even the concept of a "Karen." IMHO, it's been absolutely instrumental.
This has nothing to do with age. I wouldn't recommend assuming that you're older than me.
> "Finally, the world will see how horrible the cops can be. We will have a trial and get justice."
> That didn't remotely happen.
How has that changed? The George Floyd verdict for example is an extreme rarity. Cops are almost always acquitted.
> It's not until social media that we got e.g. BLM and even the concept of a "Karen." IMHO, it's been absolutely instrumental.
How does social media affect the verdict of trials? And what does "Karen" have to do with this?
As you'll recall, the Rodney King verdict resulted in massive multi-day riots in Los Angeles, without any help from social media, which didn't exist yet. The world was paying attention.
Oh, I'm not arguing things are perfect; just that widespread social media makes them better by making them more visible.
It's A LOT better now than then; I'd say a much larger chunk, perhaps a majority of white people more-or-less didn't really believe in "police brutality," not in a way such they would act on it.
I think the George Floyd/BLM movement has already largely failed, despite all the attention it got in 2020 and the amount of donations given to BLM and related causes - at least $10 billion.[0] Besides Juneteenth, what are the actual long-term effects of the movement in terms of material benefits for BIPOC people? DEI and ESG got a lot more popular, but that was always for the benefit of the consciousnesses of (largely white) PMC progressives, along with the relatively small number of minority employees hired as a result. Even those are getting rolled back in the face of economic headwinds, conservative counterattacks, and the Supreme Court striking down affirmative action, with an opinion whose logic can easily extend to affirmative action by private employers.
Big "winners" in this space can be dangerous, but they can also be an important tool/unfortunate necessity when it comes to national or global "news."
Which is to say, yes, I want a good replacement for Twitter because social media more-or-less succeeded where "the Rodney King story" failed.