ABC Chicago's Spain Train Crash Facebook Post Draws Criticism Over Ask For 'Likes'

ABC's local Chicago affiliate is drawing flack after they turned a Facebook post about the train crash that killed 80 people and injured dozens others in Spain into an opportunity to get more "likes."

In a (now-edited) posting, ABC Chicago last Thursday posted about surveillance video of the tragic crash and asked its Facebook followers to "like" the post in order to "send thoughts and prayers to the victims." The edited post is also hidden from the station's Facebook page.

Commenters were almost immediately critical of the ask for "likes" and it wasn't long before the post attracted the attention of the Reddit community after someone captured an image of the post -- which has received 883 likes as of Monday morning -- before the controversial language was removed. The situation also attracted the attention of DailyDot, Chicagoist and others.

As the Social News Daily blog pointed out, no apology was made by the station for the bizarre language and the next post -- "Who's ready for Friday?" -- suggests their social media manager had their eye on the weekend.