Thread by @EliotHiggins

Many of you will have spent the week viewing massive amounts of potentially traumatic imagery. Bellingcat published a guide on minimising harm from viewing such imagery bellingcat.com/resources/how-…

Vicarious trauma is a serious issue for researchers working on open source imagery from conflict. Self care is important, and with a conflict with a constant flow of intense, graphic imagery it's sometimes difficult to switch off, but please give yourself a day off.

I've never seen so much of the accountability community mobilise around any topic, particularly around open source material, so that horrific video you're watching is going to be found and preserved, its not down to you to share it and make the world aware.

Vicarious trauma can be insidious and with the impacts of it often not being immediately apparent. Andy Carvin wrote this important thread about vicarious trauma and the impact on him that I recommend reading.

https://twitter.com/acarvin/status/1106539363306037253?t=c30DyajKsQ0EjDp21ZF1kA&s=19

And it's not merely limited to viewing traumatic imagery, moral injury can play a significant factor. When you've spent a week watching civilians blown apart by cluster bombs some dick on Twitter deny what you've witnessed can impact you more deeply than you realise.

I've never seen so many people pouring through conflict imagery and that means some of them will suffer from trauma, so please take a break, go play some video games, spend time with your family, binge watch something, and don't spend another 16 hours watching people die.

And its also not a matter of being "tough", putting up enough barriers to distance yourself from the material, or becoming numb. There's always some little thing that will get past it all and embed itself in your brain before you even realise it.

A trigger can be observing an object that you have some sort of emotional connection to, like a toy your own child has, or an item of clothing that's similar to one worn by a loved. You can prepare yourself for dead bodies, mute screams, but those will always catch you off guard.

Thanks to @RajeshThind for pointing our this thread from the @DartCenter offering resources on resilience and trauma.

https://twitter.com/DartCenter/status/1499790523439009800