Category: The B.A.N.D. Report
Reading time: 3 minutes
“At first, I thought they were arguing about money. Then somebody said, ‘You made six videos about somebody you don’t even know.’”
I was outside when the argument started. Nothing about it made me think somebody would end up on the sidewalk with missing teeth and a sheet over his lower half.
One man had his phone out. The other kept pointing at it.
“That’s what you posted?” he asked.
The man holding the phone was an influencer. I recognized his face from videos where he called people out, pulled up screenshots, and told viewers he was bringing them the truth.
That night, the conversation was about his posts covering a real estate mogul’s guilty plea in federal court.
“You know him?” somebody asked.
“I know what he did,” the influencer answered.
“That ain’t what I asked.”
The influencer said people needed to know. He said he had a platform and a responsibility to speak.
The other man asked whether he had been a customer, lost money, or helped anybody involved.
He said no.
“So what did it have to do with you?”
“It’s public information.”
“Then why you talking like you cracked the case?”
A few people laughed. That seemed to bother him more than the questions.
He started explaining how much attention his coverage had received. Views. Shares. New followers. He turned his screen around as if the numbers settled the argument.
The other man barely looked.
“That’s what I’m saying. Somebody else’s downfall is your content.”
Another man standing nearby pulled out his own phone.
“Hold on. Ain’t this you telling people to send your credit guy money?”
The influencer reached toward the screen.
“That’s different.”
The man stepped back and kept scrolling. He found a promotion promising fast results and asking customers to pay before the work began.
Now everybody had questions.
Had he checked the service before recommending it? Had the customers received what they paid for? Was he getting anything for sending people there?
He kept saying they were changing the subject.
But nobody was discussing the mogul anymore.
“Yesterday you wanted everybody answering questions,” the man said. “Now we asking you.”
I couldn’t hear every word after that. People were talking over one another, and the influencer had moved closer to the man holding the phone.
Then somebody threw a punch.
He went down hard. When he turned his face, I could see gaps where his front teeth had been.
Before anyone helped him, another man grabbed at his waistband and pulled his trousers down.
Somebody shouted, “Savage Life!”
Then came the spitting.
A woman beside me yelled, “What is wrong with y’all?”
She pushed forward while somebody else called for help. A few people backed away. Others still had their phones pointed at him.
Nobody was asking about credit services now. Nobody was talking about protecting customers. They were filming a hurt man on the ground.
An officer knelt beside him and checked whether he could respond. His jewelry was scattered across the pavement. Someone brought a sheet to cover his lower body.
Police began asking who had hit him and who had been recording.
That was when several people suddenly had somewhere else to be.
I stayed long enough to explain what I had seen. I couldn’t identify everyone, and I wasn’t going to pretend I could.
What stayed with me was how quickly the subject changed.
First, they were arguing about a man turning somebody else’s trouble into content.
Minutes later, people were doing the same thing to him.
— The B.A.N.D. Report
Published through Chiraq Magazine
