A student fight, over in a flash, can live on in viral videos

Students will rate the fight and determine which bystander shot the best video. Photo by Ingrid Good 

By Ingrid Good, North High School 

A fight breaks out in a school cafeteria, and within minutes, students post videos of it on their Snapchat stories. Snapchat stories can get thousands of views, bringing attention to and promoting the violent altercations taking place in what's supposed to be a safe school environment. 

North High sophomore Zakia Delphine has clicked on these videos. She even posted a video in which she was one of the combatants. 

Even as she can get caught up in the entertainment of fighting, she acknowledges that fighting doesn't solve anything. 

“You can feel sort of proud of it,” she said. “Everyone around you is hyping you up, making you feel like it's okay. Looking back on how I acted about the fights I've been involved in, I don’t think posting your own fight is a good idea. You know, everything posted online stays online.” 

In high schools around America, students record videos of their peers fighting and post them to social media, causing the fight videos to spread like wildfire. These fights are often intense and vulnerable moments for the adversaries. 

The cause of many fights are petty comments and rumours started through social media. 

After a fight, the adrenaline is high for the fighters and witnesses. Students rush to post what they believe is the best capture. They rewatch and share and wait for adoring reviews from their peers. 

Students debate and critique on their public Snapchat stories, saying who won or lost. They even slow down and clip certain parts of the videos, dragging out the situation. 

The more intense the video, the faster it spreads. 

Zakia said she is not proud when she fights. She admits to being swept up by emotions of conflict. 

“Seeing myself fight on social media makes me a little disappointed in myself, but it felt necessary at the time,” Zakia said. “I don't like seeing me framed that way. I'm the type of person to fight anyone over anything when I was hurt and didn't know better.” 

North Principal Mauri Friestleben said staff works to create a school environment where students want to be and are likely to think twice about fighting. 

However, as schools continue to navigate how to solve conflicts and deal with fights provoked by social media, the issues are often far beyond staff capabilities. They can’t stop students from using social media to promote these conflicts. 

The North staff realizes students need a calm, stable environment to communicate the strong emotions that follow a fight. 

Behavioral deans and mediators meet with students afterward to help repair relationships so that they can get comfortable enough to share the hallways. They try to introduce ways to communicate more directly to avoid the miscommunication often caused by social media. 

“All of our support staff is here to help and speak with any students involved in any conflict,” school Dean Kori Randal said. “No matter if it is physical or not.” 

Zakia has seen how the fallout gets friends and even parents riled up. 

She recognizes that she can be vulnerable in the moment and that it is easy to get caught up in the emotions of conflict, even when it is someone else’s beef. 

“When you really sit back and think, fighting doesn't solve anything,” she said. “The people who keep fighting just need to know it's not going to fix the issue. They have to try and communicate before they jump to fighting. It's never worth it.”