Happy slapping

Happy slapping is a fad originating in the United Kingdom in which one or more people attack a victim for the purpose of recording the assault (commonly with a camera phone or a smartphone). Though the term usually refers to relatively minor acts of violence such as hitting or slapping the victim, more serious crimes such as the manslaughter of a pensioner and sexual assault have been classified as "happy slapping" by the BBC.

The ease and general availability of video cameras in mobile phones means that such attacks need not be planned carefully beforehand and are more easily watched and circulated for entertainment. Some political and media commentators claim the craze was inspired by such television shows as Jackass, Dirty Sanchez and Bumfights.

"Happy slapping" started in the South London Borough of Lewisham, in a format known as "Slap Happy TV", where a happy-slapping video would be recorded, and then watched by dozens of people like a TV show, but in the form of a montage. Videos of Happy Slapping were commonly circulated via Bluetooth on mobile phones. The first newspaper article to use the phrase "happy slapping" was "Bullies film fights by phone", published in The Times Educational Supplement on 21 January 2005, in which reporter Michael Shaw described teachers' accounts of the craze in London schools.

Gary Martin, writing on "The Phrase Finder" website described the phenomenon as: "Unprovoked attacks on individuals made in order to record the event, and especially the victim's shock and surprise, on video phones."

Martin wrote that happy slapping "began as a youth craze in the UK in late 2004. Children or passers by are slapped or otherwise mugged by one or more of a gang while others record the event on video and then distribute it by phone or Internet. Initially the attacks were, as the phrase would have us believe, fairly minor pranks ... As the craze spread the attacks became more vicious – often serious assaults known in legal circles as grievous bodily harm."

...
Wikipedia