TV and social media thrive on "immediacy," so everything is anecdote.
Now I do believe the plural of anecdote is "data," that is, you shouldn't dismiss anecdotes, but you shouldn't conclude anything off them until there's enough to start using statistical analysis to identify what is a trend v a coincidence.
The problem is the rush to judgment off insufficient data. What we "know" off a few images or interviews is often wrong in hindsight.
We know for example that police kill hundreds of people a year of all races (but we're talking almost 900,000 police), so jumping on a few isolated incidents obscures general trends, it's great for self-righteousness, but not a good guide to public policy. You want to know who was killed by whom in what circumstances, and how often it occurs - a few times a year is inevitable, any group with 900K members is going to harbor a few sociopaths and crazies. Going "postal" is a joke that reflects reality. It's just that when they're cops, they have a greater latitude to inflict harm.
Same with the current riots, until hundreds of participants are identified, we won't know if they were protesters who went over the edge, local anarchists, outside agitators or agent provocateurs or all of the above.
The key is to take a deep breath, ignore the "noise," and wait for the smoke to clear.
