ONCE again the dark side of social media has reared its ugly head.
In the days following the discovery of human remains in Kudla, posts on Facebook were littered with hundreds of comments speculating the nature of the grim find.
But once news broke that the remains had formally been identified as missing man Stephen Murphy, those posts spiralled.
Internet sleuths deposited all sorts of theories as to what lead to the alleged murder of Mr Murphy, even going as far as suggesting it was some sort of love triangle gone wrong.
As if it isn’t enough for a family and friends to have to come to terms with Mr Murphy’s death, let alone the manner in which it happened.
Imagine scrolling through hundreds of comments and seeing totally baseless claims that link the two.
For the people sitting behind the keyboard making those accusations its nothing but a throwaway comment.
But for those already grieving, it’s twisting the knife in even further.
Late last year, America was enthralled with a murder investigation after four college students were murdered in an off-campus residence in Idaho.
Social media was a flurry with all sorts of hypothesis, with so called “internet detectives” taking it upon themselves to solve the crime.
One user on TikTok went as far as linking a University of Idaho professor to the murders.
The result?
That professor has now launched a defamation lawsuit against the TikToker.
A neighbour was also targeted as a “suspect”, with friends and family subject to harassing messages from people believing they were close to cracking the case.
Nobody should have to take their Facebook page to clear their name like what Mr Murphy’s former partner, Danielle Rogers, had to do.
But that’s the problem with social media. People can throw out these comments with little to no repercussions.
In a few hours they’ve moved on with their lives.
Those impacted, though, don’t have such a luxury.
If there’s one thing to take away from this, leave the work to the experts.
And think before you type.
