Disturbing TikTok Shows Teens Mocking Death Of Kobe Bryant and 13-year-old daughter

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This should be used as evidence that as parents, we need to monitor what our kids are allowed to post on social media. A TikTok video from a young creator shows three early-teenaged boys sitting in a triangle formation. They’re labeled “Pilot,” “Kobe,” and “Gigi” and the camera begins to shake while they caption it “Helicopter crashing.” The “Pilot” character can be seen laughing as he stops the video. This video was posted within hours of Kobe Bryant‘s helicopter crash that left the basketball star, 13-year-old daughter Gianna Bryant, Sarah and Payton Chester, John Altobelli, Keri Altobelli, and Alyssa Altobelli, Christian Mauser, and pilot Ara Zobayan, all dead. Basketball fans mourned the loss of a “legend” and young women with so much potential and many flocked to sports stadiums nationwide to pay their respects.

According to Twitter users, the original poster deleted the insensitive video “real quick” after it was flogged with hate. As of 3:22 PM on January 27th, it’s not posted on his account any longer. The boy’s past videos have also been inundated with comments like “Still gonna get what’s coming to you. Deleting the video doesn’t make it go away for good,” and “we coming fo yo head buddy.” Other commenters claim to have found his personal Instagram account, phone number, email, and high school address and have published it online. FYI: These are sophomores in high school and some who appear to be full-grown adults are “coming for their heads.” Not saying that what they did is okay (at all), but that two wrongs don’t make a right and hopefully people who actually know these kids (their parents, school administrators, etc.) can be the ones doling out punishments.

How can we protect our kids from making terrible social media mistakes that, thanks to the internet, may never be forgotten? Though the boy has deleted his video from the original platform it was posted on, the video now lives on thanks to Reddit and Twitter. Perhaps our kids need to take social media training in middle school instead of Home Ec. After all, there can be real-life consequences for videos posted online — and making such an insensitive video in light of a 13-year-old basketball player, her friends, coach, and their parents all tragically dying could have effects that lasted much longer than their nine-second TikTok did.

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