Facebook fired up about Houston’s death

The same situation happened with king of pop Michael Jackson, actor Heath Ledger, singer Amy Winehouse and now, R&B artist Whitney Houston. The death of these celebrities led millions to join in mourning their deaths via various social media outlets.

A Google search of Facebook found more than 168 million messages were posted about the singer’s death.

According to the New York Times, “By 8 p.m., just an hour after Ms. Houston’s death was first reported (on Twitter), 18 percent of all Twitter posts mentioned ‘Whitney.’” On both social networks, messages were both good and bad. Much talk centered around Houston’s legacy in music and movies while others referred to her drug use. She was famous for her singing ability as well as for slipping up — as humans, tend to do.

Sadly, many heroic figures die each day, but soldiers who give the ultimate sacrifice get little media attention and proportionately far less social media coverage. A simple Google search revealed that the number of Facebook-related references to the death of a soldier at more than seven million, less than five percent of those for Houston.

People argued on social media that the death of a celebrity “stole” attention from the deaths of real heroes. Of course, we didn’t personally know all of the fallen soldiers who fought for our country, just like we didn’t personally know Whitney Houston. However, because she was a prominent person, many felt as though they did know her.

Another of the points of contention on the social media sites revolved around the New Jersey flag being flown at half staff in honor of Houston. Houston was a New Jersey girl and because she was from there, Gov. Chris Christie had the flag flown at half-staff. Some took offense to that.

The New York Times ran a story to depict this, quoting several angry Tweets directed against Gov. Christie, followed by Christie’s responses. According to the article, the majority of them focused on lowering the flag — an honor reserved for fallen soldiers or police officers — for a “crack head.”

However, people really missed the point about Houston’s death by comparing it to troops and the lack of support and mourning. The comments were blown out of proportion, and in turn fueled confrontation between social media users.

Considering that most fans only know a celebrity by their work and not personally, it is safe to say that not everyone is left devastated when a celebrity dies. Sadly, the death of a soldier gets lost in news coverage and unless we have a personal connection, we will probably never reach out over a social medium to comment about the loss.

The point is, these are two very separate issues. We give our attention to the one that is prominent to us. The loss of talented Whitney Houston taught us how society chose to respond to it, and what to expect when another celebrity ends up six feet under.

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