If you weren't following the Texas Legislature's 2013 battle over abortion online, you missed the story. Television news and print media caught the highlights, but #TamponGate, “Hail Satan” and the “jars of feces” mystery all broke online. When lawmakers took a key vote on a sweeping abortion bill after the deadline, the evidence came in the form of a senator's Instagrammed photo of a time stamp. When state police claimed to have confiscated jars of feces from Capitol protesters, the lack of photo evidence on social media suggested to many that the police were lying.
In this panel, a pro-life lobbyist, a pro-choice activist and two Texas journalists analyze how the story changed depending on your point of view and who you follow on Twitter. The panel will discuss lessons from a national news story that unfolded almost exclusively on the Internet.
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official listing on sxsw.comhttp://schedule.sxsw.com/2014/events/event_IAP22099