Instagram’s Affordances and the Visual Construction of Solidarity after a Mass Shooting

Abstract

Solidarity is a common response after a mass shooting. Social media and social media affordances, such as hashtags, are valuable technological tools after such events. How does social media facilitate the response to mass shootings? In particular, how do platform affordances shape solidarity practices? To this end, I analyzed Instagram images tagged #LafayetteStrong 2 years after a mass shooting in Lafayette, Louisiana. I observed several solidarity-inspired themes including material objects, community events and landmarks, references to support and reflection, and photographs as advertisements. I argue that Instagram affords a mediated form of solidarity, visually documenting ritualized community practices, while also facilitating individualized and subjective interpretations of solidarity. Users exploited Instagram’s affordances for advertisement purposes, capitalizing on a community-centered hashtag. These findings contribute to the sociological literature on mass shootings, the visual construction of solidarity, and the influence of technology.

Keywords

solidarity mass shooting content analysis Instagram affordances

Solidarity is a long-studied sociological phenomenon. Scholars have documented how natural disasters, terrorist acts, and mass shootings have inspired this collective response. Sociological literature has often centered on manifestations of group solidarity like ritual events and tangible displays of solidarity. Indeed, studies in the social sciences and the humanities have revealed how social media communication functions in the wake of tragic events. Furthermore, from a sociological perspective, studies of solidarity after mass shootings concentrate around particular milieu—schools (Hawdon, Oksanen, & Räsänen, 2012), yet I will argue the role of social media in the solidarity process should also be considered. Thus, extant literature fails to consider the occurrence of mass shootings in public spaces. This study seeks to remedy this disparity.

In July 2015, during a movie at the Grand 16 Theater in Lafayette, Louisiana, a man began shooting, killing two and injuring nine. Police responded quickly, and with his escape blocked, the shooter died by suicide. Afterward, the Lafayette community came together to grieve and support its members, and social media was a part of this process. #LafayetteStrong emerged as a popular hashtag across several social media platforms, including Instagram. Social media and social media affordances, such as hashtags and images, are valuable technological tools after such events. In a previous study of the Grand Theater shooting, Pearce (2017) argued that social media platforms are a tool for impression management, providing a backstage indication of users’ participation in community rituals and feelings of grief and support.

It is common for community members to turn to social media for information and for support during and after a disruptive event, and it is increasingly important to consider how social media facilitates the response to mass shootings, and in particular, how individual platforms shape solidarity practices. To address this topic, first I demarcate the boundaries of mass shooting literature in sociology. Next, I outline the theoretical gist of solidarity which foregrounds this study. The literature on social media affordances rounds out this review. I explored #LafayetteStrong images on Instagram, and I discuss how this platform shapes the particular flavor of a community’s solidarity response to a mass shooting. The significance of the locale of a mass shooting is also considered.

Literature

Mass Shooting

The Federal Bureau of Investigation defines mass murder as a single incident in which a person kills four or more people (excluding the shooter) in one location (Krouse & Richardson, 2015). In comparison, the term “mass shooting” can include victims with nonfatal injuries (Fox, Leven, & Fridel, 2018). Recent media reports have alerted readers to the seemingly mounting threat of mass shootings in America, warning of its increasing frequency and number of victims (Densley & Peterson, 2019). For example, the LA Times reports that of the 164 mass shootings in its database, 20% occurred in the last 5 years (Densley & Peterson, 2019). Similarly, in 2012, a benchmark year for mass shootings in the United States, Mother Jones created an open-source database to track these incidents. Its data has indicated that the rate of mass shootings has tripled since 2011 (Follman, Aronsen, & Pan, 2019).

Perhaps the foremost authority in sociology on mass shootings is James Alan Fox. As the “dean of death” (Rucker, 2009), he and several colleagues (e.g., Fox et al., 2018) delineated the structure and characteristics of mass shootings. He is also critical of this notion of the increasing frequency of this crime, debunking its popular misconceptions (Fox & DeLateur, 2014). The definition and classification of mass shootings vary across organizations, leading to conflicting reports about its regularity (Rand Corporation, 2018, para. 1). Despite the debate over its recurrence, mass shootings happen, and when they do, they often become the focus of media attention. Recent scholarship has offered some ideas on the connection between media and mass shootings. Newspaper coverage has been found to contribute to the public’s conceptualization of a mass shooting event (Schildkraut & Muschert, 2014) as well as shaping the public image of the offender (Altheide, 2009). Scholars also examined the role of newspapers in determining a shooting’s newsworthiness (Silva & Capellan, 2019), influencing the amount of attention devoted to a particular shooting and its victims. As social media has entered the fray, its effect on our understanding of mass shootings has grown. For example, Guggenheim, Jang, Bae, and Neuman (2015) discovered evidence of reciprocity between traditional media and Twitter, documenting the give-and-take between news media organizations and framing of mass shootings on Twitter. Furthermore, users turned to social media platforms to offer their thoughts and prayers (Mazer et al., 2015). Politically, social media has become a tool for activism in response to mass shooting events. Several of the Parkland survivors utilized social media (#NeverAgain) in a well-known campaign for gun control (Alter, 2018). Studies on social media have explored the relationship between social media use and mass shootings, either as a space where offenders find inspiration (Follman, 2015) or where academics and others can hypothesize about its recurrence (Raitanen & Oksanen, 2018). School shootings, in particular, have received more media attention than mass shootings in other public spaces (Schildkraut, Elsass, & Meredith, 2017). This is unsurprising given the age of its young victims, yet this limits the conceptualization of solidarity to a single social milieu. It is important to consider how solidarity acquires a particular flavor within the context of other spaces, as it is likely that publicly shared spaces, like a movie theater as examined here, invoke unique shades of solidarity. Having briefly addressed the literature on mass shootings, I turn the theory of solidarity.

Solidarity

In sociology, Emile Durkheim’s (1912) theory foregrounds much of the research on solidarity. His work defined the role of public presence in the development of solidarity, inspiring a collective effervescence (Durkheim, 1912) among participants. More recent work upholds this notion; groups accrue benefits from ritualistic funeral practices and collective expressions of emotion like those documented after September 11, 2001 (Collins, 2004). Scholars have also analyzed the displays of solidarity after mass shootings; however, this research is largely focused on schools (e.g., Jokela and Kauhajoki in Finland) and college campuses (e.g., Virginia Tech). For instance, following the Virginia Tech massacre, students and faculty reportedly displayed high levels of solidarity and took part in vigils and rallies (Hawdon & Ryan, 2012). In Finland, citizens shared grief and offered support during prayer vigils and other ritualized events after two unrelated school shootings (Nurmi, Räsänen, & Oksanen, 2011). Likewise, after 9/11, citizens were drawn to the resulting emotional energy (Collins, 2004), uniting around collective grief rituals and building common alliances. This attempt to participate in community grief practices likely applies to social media platforms as well. Indeed, social media users have expressed grief (Leaver & Highfield, 2018), sought support (Paulus & Varga, 2015), and connected with loved ones (Irwin, 2015). Facebook, in particular, has become a ritualized space for mourners visiting users’ online memorials, a page on which loved ones bond over their shared loss (Brubaker, Hayes, & Dourish, 2013). Thus, social media memorializing (Scott, 2017) has become a modern component in this process.

Researchers have studied this effect among Instagram posts tagged #funeral (Gibbs, Meese, Arnold, Nansen, & Carter, 2014; Leaver & Highfield, 2018; Meese et al., 2015). While many of the sampled images contained photographs of funeral attendees and ritualized elements of the funereal process, many also included selfies (Gibbs et al., 2014; Leaver & Highfield, 2018; Meese et al., 2015). Their findings also observed landscapes, group photographs, as well as memes and popular culture references among the images. In this way, digital photographs are a form of visual communication (van Dijck, 2008). The emergent vernacular is aligned with a platform’s affordances (Gibbs et al., 2014), and the solidarity literature will benefit from the examination of images posted after a mass shooting, particularly one occurring in a public space like the Grand Theater shooting. Thus, to round out this review of relevant literature, social media affordances will be addressed.

Affordances

Instagram (2019b) boasts 1 million active monthly users on its platform. Stories, IGTV, and, most recently, Thread, a photo-sharing and social messaging app, make up the family of features available to Instagram users. Unlike Facebook, users do not have a page; instead, their account is a feed of uploaded images. To create their feed, users upload images quickly and easily from their mobile devices using the Instagram app. Reportedly, over 50 billion images have been uploaded to Instagram, indicating that photographs are no longer reserved for special occasions; they also document the banalities of everyday life as vehicles for visual communication (Gibbs et al., 2014; Meese et al., 2015), and the number of image-related platforms (SnapChat, Flickr, TikTok) evinces this medium. After a death, pictures can contextually situate the user and convey emotion (Gibbs et al., 2014; Meese et al., 2015). Death-related photography is not new, but its display in public online spaces for public viewing may be a contemporary adaptation to Instagram’s visual prerequisites (Gibbs et al., 2014).

As such, social media platforms afford particular functions after a loved one’s death. In contrast to Facebook, Twitter users frequently rely on hashtags, not users’ account pages, to connect with others, creating an imagined audience (Marwick & Boyd, 2011) among which users find community. After violent events and natural disasters, hashtags also have afforded many uses, such as expressing sympathy and solidarity (Curato, 2017), offering condolences (De Cock & Pedraza, 2018), and sharing news and information (Bautista & Lin, 2015). Researchers have studied this effect among Instagram posts tagged #funeral (Gibbs et al., 2014; Meese et al., 2015), facilitating efforts at presencing, positioning users in relation to the deceased while situating online social networks close to the ritualized grief process (Meese et al., 2015). Instagram’s affordances, offering possible avenues for platform-based use to facilitate, inspire and even challenge (Scott, 2017) its users’ visual communication.

In his study of public death events, Scott (2017) found users engaging in social media memorializing, harnessing the interpersonal and mechanical functions of YouTube to collectively grieve Neda Agha-Soltan in Tehran in 2009 and Lee Rigby in London in 2013. Here, users “sacralise [sic] the victims, perform grief, and construct a moral story” (Scott, 2017, p. 219). Similarly, the murder of diplomat, Sean Smith, inspired players of EVE Online to commemorate his death as a fellow player within the game, erecting (digital) shrines in his honor (Gibbs, Carter, & Mori, 2013). These studies delineate the affordances of various social media platforms. In this way, I consider the relevance of Instagram’s affordances on the visual display of solidarity. I seek to offer further clarification of collective solidarity practices online. The intersection of three strands of literature as I have reviewed thus far presents several questions. How do the collected images reflect community solidarity practices? How does the type and locale of this type of crime affect the flavor of this solidarity? How do Instagram’s affordances shape online solidarity practices?

Method

Based on the purpose of this study, I chose thematic analysis as the appropriate method. Qualitative analysis is commonly adopted to explore existing images, uncover themes, and to observe how solidarity is displayed. #LafayetteStrong appeared on July 23, 2015, the day of the shooting, and was promoted as part of Lafayette Strong rally held 1 week later. Lafayette Strong spanned several platforms, including Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram; however, I limited my data to Instagram. This is in line with current social media scholarship and the growing body of research on Instagram and social media memorialization (Gibbs et al., 2014; Meese et al., 2015; Scott, 2017). I manually collected and temporarily stored any images posted on July 23, 2015, until July 2017. However, to protect users from undue risk, I did not collect users’ personal information. Like previous scholars (Baker & Walsh, 2018), I adhered to ethical standards ensuring the anonymity of social media users among the sampled images. Furthermore, not only are the sampled images publicly available, but I interpreted the contextual meaning of #LafayetteStrong as a community-oriented hashtag that had little potential to do harm to its users (Highfield & Leaver, 2016).

I systematically viewed the images noting the emergent types, content, focus, and setting of the photographs. I also documented the use of any filters or manipulations of the images including the addition of text. Over the course of this review process, I cataloged nascent themes. If a photograph did not fit with the collected images, I checked the picture and its accompanying text for any connection to the Lafayette Strong hashtag. During analysis, I recorded written memos about the themes, corresponding subthemes, and the characteristics of the images belonging to each theme.

Based on existing research and cultural familiarity with the X-strong model (Lin & Margolin, 2014; Zimmer, 2013), I expected pictures representing solidarity to be present. What remained to be discovered was the content of these images and how Instagram’s affordances shape the collective meaning of this display. Therefore, I left the agency and intention of the individuals posting the Lafayette Strong photographs unexamined.

Findings and Analysis

Among that data, I discerned several visual themes of solidarity: (a) individuals or groups at community events and local landmarks; (b) material objects; (c) references to support, comfort, or reflection; and (d) photographs as advertisements. Within the first theme, posted photographs featured participation in community rituals. Often images exuded a sensation of activity as people decorated prayer flags, attended rallies, held candles, volunteered, purchased Lafayette Strong merchandise, prayed during church services, and visited the Grand Theater memorial, much like the solidarity practices witnessed after other mass shootings (Bingham et al., 2009; Nurmi, 2012). Unlike other death-related hashtags (Gibbs et al., 2014; Leaver & Highfield, 2018; Meese et al., 2015), very few individual selfies emerged; most featured groups. Through attendance at a community event, posing among the bustle, subjects demonstrated togetherness. Subjects also showcased their solidarity by flashing some item representative of Lafayette culture. In addition, photographs included wide shots of crowds, indiscriminately capturing community events like that at the local art museum, during which attendees designed and hung prayer flags honoring victims. Indeed, Lafayette landmarks, neighborhoods, and public spaces offered a recurring backdrop for solidarity practices and community activities. In other pictures, people gathered for a public prayer vigil at a downtown park. The manifestations of solidarity in this set aligned with those in other mass shootings (Spencer & Muschert, 2009); citizens spontaneously transformed the base of the Grand Theater sign into a memorial site, taking and posting photographs from this spot.

Photographs of the rallies, vigils, and local gatherings confirm face to face solidarity practices in Lafayette after the shooting. As Durkheim (1912) argued, rituals manifest a collective effervescence within a group, solidifying the bonds between members. Similar to mass shootings in Finland and in the United States (Hawdon, Oksanen, & Räsänen, 2012), sampled photographs offer evidence of community members collectively participating in solidarity practices. Furthermore, photographs of community participation and local landmarks act as a form of presencing (Meese et al., 2015). Users position themselves and their online social network within the ritualized community solidarity process (Meese et al., 2015), digitally grounding their experiences. As a result, posts simultaneously act as proof of community members’ participation at such events (Author, 2017), amassing a corpus of photographic evidence of community solidarity and offering a visual checks-and-balances for online claims of support.

The second theme, material objects, contained numerous photographs featuring symbols of Lafayette, Acadiana, or south Louisiana culture. The flag of Acadiana (a region comprised of 22 parishes in south Louisiana with a strong French history), the state of Louisiana, the word Cajun or Lafayette, local food dishes, and images from the local music scene frequently appeared. T-shirts, caps, lapel pins, jewelry, posters, folk art pieces, and bumper stickers also emerged as tokens of solidarity. Lafayette Strong merchandise, like yard signs, were brandished in flower beds and on cars. Artwork also surfaced as a common focal point, hanging on walls, arranged in tableaus, or even in progress. These pieces embraced emblems of Lafayette culture, like the fleur de lis, a well-known local symbol. Finally, among this theme, pictures exhibited mementos from community events after the shooting, spotlighting volunteer name badges, candles from vigils, and items purchased from Jillian Johnson’s (a victim and beloved community member) local shops.

Like photographs of community gatherings, material objects also signify community attachment (Collins, 2004; Turkel, 2002). In these photographs, possession and online display of cultural and tragedy-centered icons evinces a fondness for the local culture, the city, and the region. As an image-based platform, Instagram functions as an instrument for creating and reinforcing local solidarity. Under #LafayetteStrong, photographs transform into visual communication tools (van Dijck, 2008), extending tangible evidence of local culture and belonging. The joint visual display of local items differentiates Lafayette as unique and reminding viewers of their collective identity. In contrast to research on disasters (Bautista & Lin, 2015; David, Ong, & Legara, 2016), in the week following the shooting, most of the images centered on emotional support.

A separate category including cultural symbols also emerged; these were differentiated by the defined sense of support they imparted. Memes prevailed in this category; absent is the exhibition of cultural keepsakes. Instead, this theme held cultural and religious references, symbols of Louisiana, but with added references to love, strength, and prayers. For instance, the flag colors of Acadiana or the likeness of the flag reiterated cultural significance throughout these memes. As the photographs in previous themes, memes here incorporated statements of solidarity. Similarly, shapes representing the state of Louisiana (commonly with a heart where Lafayette is located) and the fleur de lis with messages such as Prayers for Lafayette, and Lafayette Strong, illustrated wishes of unity. Furthermore, in contrast to disruptive events (Eriksson, 2018), memes imparted a feeling of solemnity, not humor. Frequently, pictures carried messages of comfort within this theme. As an example, one set of photographs referenced coffee—an artfully filled mug, people drinking coffee together, and an individual displaying their place setting at a cafe. Similarly, images revealed verdant landscapes, a setting sun, or a lakeside view, evincing a sense of calm, creating a supportive, and inspiring feeling for the viewer. Thus, photographs with this motif categorically declared solidarity, while others creatively played on the soothing undertones of scenery and cultural allusions to serenity for this message.

Support is commonplace after disruptive events (Lin & Margolin, 2014). Like photographs, memes can be seen as a social currency online (Rainie, Brenner, & Purcell, 2012) and can represent a bid for entry into an online community. When a violent event occurs in a community, group identity gains salience, and community members erect symbolic boundaries. Social media is a modern component in this process, and as in the face to face community, social media communities construct implicit normative structures (Wagner, 2018) to distinguish between members and nonmembers. Memes are an easy, accessible way to contribute to online solidarity practices and, thus, belong to the affected group.

The final theme detected among the #LafayetteStrong images was advertisements. Like other social media platforms, Instagram (2019a) is a marketing tool. Here, image-based content clearly displayed information about Lafayette businesses, local entrepreneurs, artists, craftspeople, and public events. Many images in this theme provided details on local gatherings supporting the victims, like fund-raisers, vigils, and rallies. Sometimes images consisted of text against a solid background, while in others, the photograph featured a product. In some pictures, the product was emblazoned with a slogan or phrase supporting Lafayette or the shooting victims; others promoted Lafayette-themed artwork. The advertisements present among these data are not the brand-sponsored ads peppered throughout personal Instagram feeds, nor are they the slick, stylized photographs of influencers in the Instagram economy (Hardey, 2015). Instead, photographic advertisements give off the aura of entrepreneurs or customers who are simply leveraging an Instagram account in an attempt at visibility. Interestingly, posts marketed businesses or promoted products oftentimes unrelated to the shooting. In fact, most advertisement images lacked a coherent connection to the shooting. Instead, the majority of the pictures and images solicited customers and attendees for routine goods and services, such as those for local shops and poetry readings.

Overall, photographs revealed the public gatherings and rituals of collective morning in the community. However, direct identification of the shooting victims among photographs was essentially nonexistent; instead, photographs visually constructed a victimized community (Ryan & Hawdon, 2008). Based on these data, location is a meaningful component of the Grand Theater shooting. Like the theater in Aurora, Colorado, and Virginia Tech campus, the Grand 16 Theater is hallowed grounds (Hawdon, Ryan, & Agnich, 2010), accessible to all. The intended target could have been anyone. When asked why she attended a vigil following the Aurora shooting, one Denver resident stated, “We come to this theater all the time. This is our family. This is our community. It could have been me,” (Blond, 2012). Because the offender violated a shared space, the perceived sense of risk was heightened, and it affected the types of images users posted, yielding a form of solidarity flavored with community and local culture.

Discussion and Conclusion

The question remains in this analysis, how do Instagram’s affordances affect online solidarity practices? Instagram affords users, and in this case, members of the local community to confirm ritual collective practices of grief and solidarity after a disruptive event. Solidarity practices and online good wishes are commonplace after mass shootings, yet the shape of this solidarity often varies. The flavor of that solidarity is influenced by a platform’s affordances. Furthermore, the Lafayette Strong hashtag affords users the opportunity to gather in an online space much like the public spaces featured in the photographs. There are no moderators for this affordance. In this way, users can contribute what they feel moved to use the hashtag, and interpretations of solidarity vary from support, offers of prayers, to scenic photographs. Similar to earlier research (Gibbs et al., 2013; Scott, 2017), there is some freedom of expression regarding posted images on Instagram. Instagram’s affordances, such as photo-sharing and tagging, contribute to the platform vernacular (Gibbs et al., 2014) after the shooting; people may want to share a particular moment because of its significance but also because of how an image looks. Instagram is known for its aesthetic (Boy & Uitermark, 2017) and this hints at a mediated solidarity in which users participate as it unfolds through ritualized community practices, while maintaining a curated online identity. In contrast, other platforms reveal different affordances, such as Twitter where information, rather than emotion (Bautista & Lin, 2015) is prevalent.

The data sampled encompassed a 2-year time span, and this is most evident among the photographs in the final subtheme, advertisements. As a corpus, the data contain many seemingly unrelated photographs, like public poetry readings, medical services, and barbershops. The day after the shooting very few posts appear to be advertisements. However, the presence of these images increases tremendously over time. By the end of the 2-year period, these data consist mainly of advertisements. Unlike websites and users’ social media pages, hashtags are not policed by moderators or account holders. An Instagram user can tag any image with a hashtag regardless of congruity. Users can exploit this function to promote their services as Instagram is an efficient visual marketing tool (Baker & Walsh, 2018). In this context, Instagram’s affordances allow users to build a community around a collective wound, while inadvertently creating a potential economic market. As time passes and fewer people post images directly reflecting solidarity after the shooting, Instagram affords businesses, community organizations, and entrepreneurs the ability to capture the attention of local markets, tapping into the cultural and emotional zeitgeist. After the focus on the shooting waned in Lafayette, #LafayetteStrong lingered as a tool, and Instagram as a space, capitalizing on a shared tragedy. By integrating advertising practices with Instagram, businesses can participate in and display community support and solidarity while also bolstering their local business image.

The advertisements among these data expose the opportunity to manipulate platform affordances to share content. As discussed earlier, businesses and entrepreneurs can exploit the functions of a particular platform, utilizing its technological capabilities in the hope of monetary gain. Although photographs and images make up most of the advertising content, some text-centric images also surfaced here. Composed of a solid color background emblazoned with a written message, this technically constitutes an image, yet it manipulates Instagram’s visual requirement and directly communicates with the viewer. Harnessing Instagram’s affordances, users test the boundaries of the platform for the sake of solidarity (or otherwise). Accordingly, the shape of online solidarity yields to the conditions of the social media platform and to the resourcefulness of its users.

With no major legislative or cultural shift in sight, it is an unfortunate likelihood that mass shootings will continue. This study provides insight into the affordances of social media after a violent event. This may be especially true for cases like the Grand Theater shooting which occurred between strangers in a public space. Instagram provides a space where users’ images can offer support and also aid in the construction of the community as a victim. Instagram’s visual platform allows users to move beyond the “thoughts and prayers” sentiment (Mazer et al., 2015) and, instead, push the viewer to become a witness to the visual construction of solidarity in an affected community. Scholars documented the responses to shootings in the past (Lin & Margolin, 2014; Mazer et al., 2015), yet it is important to acknowledge the affordances inherent to each platform and how the collective response is shaped by these differences. The normative practices that emerged after the Grand Theater shooting hint at the structure of the platform and its effect on what is shared. Furthermore, Instagram’s power is maximized on mobile phones. Users can take, alter, and upload photos in a matter of seconds. Thus, technological affordances should be considered an integral part of the solidarity process. Also instructive might be the demographic characteristics of Instagram users who posted to #LafayetteStrong, which should be examined in future studies. Based on these data, the effects of solidarity on Instagram use are unclear, and I am unable to demonstrate any connection between Instagram use and feelings of solidarity among community members after the shooting. However, the #LafayetteStrong images provide proof of solidarity and participation in solidarity practices within the community, contributing to the visual construction of solidarity online. Furthermore, earlier findings indicate the influence of “likes,” comments, and the sharing of Instagram images on its users (Ging & Garvey, 2017). In particular, online community members can acquire status and identity recognition from fellow users (Baker & Walsh, 2018); therefore, it is important that scholars consider how technological capabilities could contribute to the construction of solidarity online. Future research should continue to explore the relationship between the content of users’ online posts, the technological affordances of social media platforms, and the multifaceted connection to their followers.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

ORCID iD

Jessica S. Pearce

Author Biography

Jessica S. Pearce is an assistant professor at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. She studies online communities, meaning-making, and patterns of interaction online.

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