Snapchat with the dead
Last month I found out that someone I knew had passed away and I had realized that her Snapchat story was still live. I viewed the story, three pictures, but the one that I remember the most is a sunset picture. It had a caption that I can’t fully recall, but something like ‘living young.’
That was shockingly surreal to me. Obviously, I always knew that one day I would die. But seeing a person that I knew, younger than me die from something quite preventable and share her last moments on Snapchat to then be gone forever was bizarre.
One of the Orlando Shooting victims had also shared their final moments on Snapchat, this creates a unique and deep real life sharing aspect. Snapchat is often seen as a quirky platform of teens sharing selfies with filters. But it is, and can be so much more than that.
When we have the tools to share experiences near our deaths, the most feared aspect of life, and even share our deaths what does that create in the content consumers brain? Surrealism, shock, fear..
But even further than that we begin to truly understand that we are all mortals that will too someday die. That is something that is difficult to comprehend for a lot of people, but when you see the final moments of a loved one or a friend in video or photographs, you are forced to face the unmerciful truth of life, death.
Some may take viewing that as a call to be more cautious in life and not take risks. I think that is the wrong answer. For me, it motivates me to do more while I am alive and make a positive difference in the life around me each day. Because tomorrow is never guaranteed, but today is, because you are living it right now.
It also makes me want to capture my life’s moments on platforms such as Snapchat and Instagram because we all seek a sense of acknowledgement. A sense of having our place in the world. So create that place, you are the controller of your own life. Death will come knocking. Answer with the courage that you did your best.
