Some examples of news stories where ‘citizen journalism’ has exposed or highlighted abuses of power.
1. The shooting of Charles Kinsey
The story
“As long as I’ve got my hands up, they’re not going to shoot me. This is what I’m thinking,” Kinsey said in an interview with WSVN-TV from a hospital bed on Wednesday. “Wow, was I wrong.”
Q1.How does this picture affect the story?
The picture shows a man lying on the ground with his hands in the air. It is a very static image that does not communicate any threat at all. The contrast between the image and what happened next is extreme. The image makes the story even more shocking.
Q2. Is this picture objective?
There is no clue in the picture to suggest what happened next and to that extent it seems objective. But something is going on that isn’t shown by the simple image. There was a reason for the photographer to take the video. Perhaps they were aware that such confrontations can easily and too often go wrong and to that extent the image has a spin which is not objective.
2. The arrest of Ieshia Evans.
Demonstrator Ieshia Evans protesting the shooting death of Alton Sterling is detained by law enforcement near the headquarters of the Baton Rouge Police Department in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, July 9, 2016. REUTERS/Jonathan Bachman
The Story
“Then they put me in a van and drove me away. Only hours later did someone explain that I was arrested for obstructing a highway.
They took our possessions and fingerprinted us. Then they stuck four of us women in a room together and had four officers strip-search us. We were all ordered to take off everything, to bend over, and to cough. There was no privacy, no dignity. We were treated as if we were murderers or child molesters. It was degrading. It angered me. These were black female officers, and they were treating us as if we were criminals.”
Jonathan Bachman said, “That was the first image I transferred [to Reuters] because I knew it was going to be an important photo. You can take images of plenty of people getting arrested, but I think this one speaks more to the movement and what the demonstrators are trying to accomplish here in Baton Rouge.”
http://time.com/4403440/baton-rouge-protest-photo-ieshia-evans/
Q1.How does this picture affect the story?
The picture shows a woman standing upright and unafraid in face of a charge by three police in full riot gear. Her calm, immobile dignity is an extreme contrast to the chaotic stance of the riot police which heightens the sense of injustice in the story.
Q2. Is this picture objective?
The picture is not objective. The photographer has isolated this image from everything else that may have been going on around this tableau vivant. The reason for the line of riot police being there at all is missing. The object of the image is to make us see a single, well-defined act of injustice.
Q3. Can pictures ever be objective?
For
A forensic photograph can be objective because it simply needs to show what is there in the same way as a picture of events in a cloud chamber is objective. An image taken by the Hubble telescope is objective too. Such pictures are simple records. Images like these are not subjective because their intention is not limited to a creative response to an object.
Against
However, it is true that the meaning of a word lies in its use and the same is true of images. A forensic image derives its whole meaning from the context in which it is used. A cloud chamber image proves a theorem. An image of a galaxy is given colour and drama and appeals to our sense of wonder.
Street photographers wait for the decisive moment. Landscape photographers wait until the light is just so. Everyone chooses the moment at which to press the button and once there is choice objectivity is lost. Even a series taken at random intervals contains the choice to be random.
Chris Whittle 