LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online • Hacker News Board

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#391

Post by concordDance » Thu, May 06, 2021, 9:21 AM UTC

avereveard wrote: post #298

imranq wrote: post #216

Why is there so much fetishization of violent content in the comments? Sure maybe liveleak provided some footage you couldn't get on youtube and that is indeed a loss, but to think that the violence you see represents the truth is just as bad as denying that any bad happens in the world. The world is far larger than any one mind can handle. I wouldn't judge it from a few videos taken out of context. The world can be…

> fetishization of violent content [...] few videos taken out of context it's literally the opposite, it's not for the of violence, it's the unadulterated content: every other outlet either filter or worse, "narrates" hevaily cut snippets out of source material. and we already live in a bubble as it is. having some amount of "ground truth" was certainly better than none. and I said as one that steered clear from the…

The snipping in particular is pretty cancerous. Distilling a five hour event or talk into a 2 minute highlights reel loses all nuance.

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#392

Post by baybal2 » Thu, May 06, 2021, 9:25 AM UTC

jonathanstrange wrote: post #386

baybal2 wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember American TV regularly showing things like Palestinian children blown to bits back in nineties, or atrocities of wars in Africa, and then it somehow just disappeared.

Showing these kind of things has always been against the ethical standards of journalism and exceptions to it used to be discussed intensively by editors - excluding the tabloid yellow press who make their living from this trash, of course. I guess some of the more recent American TV channels realized at some point, after they had gained fame for showing everything, that quotas are not everything and that relatives u…

Excuse me, but showing "Palestinian children blown to bits" was probably the biggest contributor to global pressure on Israel which resulted in Oslo accords, Israeli military pullout from Lebanon, and Rwanda not burning to the ground completely.

Such things indeed play a vitally important role.

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#393

Post by dTal » Thu, May 06, 2021, 9:26 AM UTC

Sebb767 wrote: post #93

nostromo wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

War and terrorism was definitely made “more real” on LiveLeak than what you’d experience via the media or YouTube. I also found a real appreciation for other things: driving safely, worker protections, fire safety. These “boring” things take on more importance when you can see what happens when you ignore them. I don't think people should dwell on these morbid things. But seeing just one or two videos of, for example…

Especially fire safety seems like something people don't realize. Sure, the rules can seem overly strict and sometimes even nonsensical on the first glance, but it's insane how fast the situation can go from "smale flame" to "house on fire". Seeing the worst case play out is really eye-opening.

I don't think it was LiveLeak, but seeing the footage of the Station Nightclub fire online was enough to permanently change how I view crowds and indoor spaces. That stuff is quite scarring - but I'm grateful for the knowledge.

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#394

Post by pessimizer » Thu, May 06, 2021, 9:34 AM UTC

dmos62 wrote: post #369

causality0 wrote: post #69

I do hope you also understand our reasons I mean, I'd like to try, except he didn't actually give us any of those reasons. Rest in peace, LiveLeak. You were a beacon of reality that shone through the propaganda, the bullshit, and the sugar-coating. Your demise means that people who want to see something like a shooting that's been removed from mainstream platforms will be forced to visit darker corners of the interne…

> Now if someone asks me "Hey where can I go see that thing that was taken off of Youtube" I don't have a ready answer that isn't an alt-right cesspool. You complain about some sites being alt-right cesspools, as if being a cesspool is not bad on its own.

Those places are cesspools because white supremacists are there. A cesspool isn't a cesspool until you fill it with shit.

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#395

Post by andai » Thu, May 06, 2021, 9:35 AM UTC

ta_ca wrote: post #329

andai wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The userbase is also becoming worse, because they're attracting the kind of idiots that respond to design like that.

on reddit you can say something factual yet outside party line and can get downvoted to oblivion or get deleted on some subreddits but your post might survive on some other subreddit. hn is just a big subreddit with one party line. we get bombarded by party propaganda. almost everything is anti-others. seeing through propaganda, stating the obvious or pointing the elephant in the room is autamatically and convenientl…

I wouldn't go that far, but it's certainly not a free speech platform. That does have its advantages, though. 4chan, for example, takes a toll on my mind -- even when I'm careful about which parts I visit.

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#396

Post by secondcoming » Thu, May 06, 2021, 9:35 AM UTC

74d-fe6-2c6 wrote: post #351

throwawaysea wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agree. I was never that cognizant of what ISIS/ISIL/Daesh were capable of until I saw videos on LiveLeak that made it all very real. You won’t find those anywhere else, but I dare say that the emotions those stir in the viewer create political clarities that are razor sharp, in a way you can’t get through overly academic and stoic news articles.

Getting your head cut off and die within few seconds isn't more cruel than getting half your face ripped off and a leg due to an airstrike and then bleeding to death over the course of several minutes. Isis was just more honest with their inhumanity.

There are videos of beheadings where it literally takes minutes for the head to be cut off. It's not a swift blow to the neck with a sword. I remember one where the executioner had to borrow a knife from someone in the crowd because his wasn't sharp enough.

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#397

Post by orthoxerox » Thu, May 06, 2021, 9:37 AM UTC

praptak wrote: post #342

jobigoud wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here as part of the process to regain your points they made you visit a hospital where car crash patients were treated.

That sounds effective but how do they deal with patients' privacy? Do patients have the option of not being made a showcase?

It probably reduced the number of penalty points the patients themselves had.

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#398

Post by nickthemagicman » Thu, May 06, 2021, 9:39 AM UTC

weedfroglozenge wrote: post #250

userbinator wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That would change if people start using it more as a LiveLeak replacement. (The name is somewhat amusing for someone with knowledge of Australian slang.)

Bitch ute?

Whats a ute in Aussie lang?

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#399

Post by DyslexicAtheist » Thu, May 06, 2021, 9:40 AM UTC

AndrewUnmuted wrote: post #252

hilbertseries wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Man those essays are some hot garbage. If you read them, you come away thinking that the US just decided to attack Iraq to make a point to Saddam. Let me quote it > Unlike earlier wars, in which there were political aims either of conquest or domination, what is at stake in this one is war itself: its status, its meaning, its future. A beautiful sentence, but Saddam invaded Kuwait with the intent of conquering it. Th…

I never came away thinking these things after reading those essays. The novel insights he presents in these essays deal with the West's ability to structure the narrative - via mass-media - of the Gulf War, resulting in the very real and senseless violence that occurred. All the while for the citizens of those Western nations though, none of the "Vietnam effect" was witnessed. In a sense, your post proves his point q…

great comment. some thoughts .

> this war began and ended

technically it did. realistically it hasn't for those who live there? (see also Afghanistan where the women and children now get to enjoy the mess and radicalization the US left behind). Maybe Iraq ended because we decided not to look at it any more?

> Should somebody have rightfully stepped in and stopped us from engaging in these conquests?

not sure if it would have made a difference, the real question IMO is Should they have intervened in the first place?. My own opinion has shifted in the past 20 years or so from supporting the West to step in and "do something! please anything to make it stop", to "how dare they suggest anything without cleaning up their own filthy disgusting hypocrite acts first". I believe the only way to make the West better is to implement change in our own society first (that is if we really want to have the audacity to lecture others). We can still use economic pressure to fight things but the moment our dear leaders suggest "pre-emptive strikes" there will be hypocrisy and injustice.

Also these events don't happen (didn't happen) in a vacuum. In this specific case the US can be blamed for repeating the same mistake[1] which the UK colonial powers decades before made when they invented "modern Iraq" by supporting niche groups and placing them into a position of power. In a way this is like somebody invading and toppling the US-regime in 2021, not understanding anything about the country, and giving the nuclear codes to the Amish (not that there is anything wrong with Amish culture or tradition but they do not represent the majority of the people). The US then propped up an illegitimate regime due to ignorance of the actual power dynamics in the local society at the time.

[1] https://archive.globalpolicy.org/security/issues/iraq/histor...

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#400

Post by nickthemagicman » Thu, May 06, 2021, 9:42 AM UTC

spoonjim wrote: post #55

Four LiveLeak videos will always stay in my head. WARNING: even in text this stuff is horrifying. Stop reading if you don’t want to have nightmares. 1) an ISIS video where a 7 year old kid or so goes through a building where a bunch of hostages are tied up. He shoots them dead in succession. He looks like he’s about to cry throughout the whole video — but he doesn’t. 2) a completely covered up woman(?) in Iran is exe…

For me it was the crackhead who climbed the telephone pole, got electrocuted by touching the wires, which caused him to fall off the pole, and then he then just stood up and walked off while on fire.

It made me both want to avoid crack and want to do crack.

That kind of invulnerability would be incredible.