Grief in the Age of Social Media

I had a tight feeling in my chest on Friday. I spent the day mining for details about the victims of the Aurora shooting, and it was the kind of pain that felt so awful and yet so valuable.

I wanted to know everything: Who they were, what they were like, who they left behind. What set this event apart from other similarly awful events in U.S. history was that I could learn all of those details through Facebook and Twitter.

Through social media we have the ability to celebrate the lives of those like 24-year-old Jessica Redfield -- who has largely become the face of this tragic day -- in a way that wasnt possible before.

I spent much of Friday pouring over Jessica's tweets…
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