figured something out

probably

video actually is bad for understanding things that have happened more often than not
biology textbooks are interesting because they're often lovingly illustrated with blown out drawings in lots of colors with labels

but sometimes interspersed are photos of (eg) cells under microscopes

the latter, despite being a "true" image, are often less useful for learning
here for example is a stained slide of some epithelial tissue (or some other kind, who knows)

in fact here are a bunch of kinds of tissue (a bunch of similar cells)

stain and magnification aside--themselves an visual aides--this is what cells "look" like

what have you learned?
Here is another depiction of a cell

It is not at all what a cell "looks" like as you can see from above

But I bet it is much more useful in finding out about cells: it has lots of labels, different bits that are invisible above are colored in contrast and blown up, and so on
Both of these are useful of course, and complimentary.

Without knowing much about cells, the carefully laid out diagram is much more helpful in learning a bit about what the hell a cell is.

Of course, if you only saw the diagram you would be missing other crucial context.
Videos of (eg) police shootings are great because historically police controlled narratives around police violence; people got to see a diagram of a cell drawn by cells. Very tidy, very helpful, and in this case deeply misleading

Video makes such authorial abuses difficult
at the same time, videos are really not complete evidence; they suppress information and elide context
Blake was repeatedly shot in the back . . . maybe carrying a knife, after someone reported a violent rape (not depicted)

Floyd died while a cop kneeled on him . . . with vast quantities of fentanyl in his system (not depicted)
I'm not offering a judgment about any of these cases per se

Rather just want to highlight that in every case the immediate public reaction is based entirely on rapidly-available video that is evaluated exclusively on its own merits sans any diagram analogue
Video is incomplete, moves very quickly online without context, and as audiovisual information is much more evocative that prose is difficult to criticize

So

Expect lots of dumb decisions made on the basis of it going forward I guess

Contemplate this on the Tree of Woe
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