Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

[Satchmo Distel]

Russian air crash today. Front page on Guardian site has photos of people who have clearly just heard that their loved ones were on the plane. It seems grossly invasive to me and I feel the Grauniad, of all sites, should not post them.

Clickbait, grief porn? Fucking outrageous IMHO.

[MsD]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

You're right.

[WOM]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

Are you talking about that lone photo of the man in the blue 'puffy jacket' holding a woman? That's a far cry from exploitative 'grief porn'.

Far better that than the inevitable snaps "posted to Facebook just hours before they died" type shots, which are coming soon.

[Guy Profumo]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

WOM wrote: Are you talking about that lone photo of the man in the blue 'puffy jacket' holding a woman? That's a far cry from exploitative 'grief porn'.

Far better that than the inevitable snaps "posted to Facebook just hours before they died" type shots, which are coming soon.

(I disagree. When this story broke, the BBC illustrated it with a map of the Sinai Peninsula )

[WOM]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

You disagree with what?

I'm saying that a tasteful single shot of a couple is far from clickbait/grief porn. I'm not saying there aren't other ways to illustrate the story. But in the end, this is a story of people, victims and their surviving families. 'People shots' aren't inappropriate.

[Satchmo Distel]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

Not a single shot, a video:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/video/2015/oct/31/russian-relatives-await-news-egypt-plane-crash-victims-video

[laverte]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

WOM wrote: But in the end, this is a story of people, victims and their surviving families.

I'm not sure about that. Outside of Russia and Egypt, I think it's a story of OMG THAT COULD BE ME NEXT!!!! To be followed by speculation about causes.

The victims' photos are there to give you a taste of the atmosphere in an airport in the aftermath of a crash, and to show you what it would look like for your family and friends if you had been on the plane. But that's what fiction is for.

[WOM]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

Satchmo Distel wrote: Not a single shot, a video:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/video/2015/oct/31/russian-relatives-await-news-egypt-plane-crash-victims-video

Yes, that's far more graphic as far as grief goes. I guess it comes down to interpretation as to whether they're accurately covering a terrible story or are exploiting grief for 'ratings'. I don't know that it's an easy one to categorize.

To laverte's point, the photos are certainly there to give you a taste of the atmosphere in the airport. I don't know if that's out of line. But the whole "OMG...could be me" is surely your interpretation of their motivations.

[Bruno]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

laverte wrote: I'm not sure about that. Outside of Russia and Egypt, I think it's a story of OMG THAT COULD BE ME NEXT!!!! To be followed by speculation about causes.

The victims' photos are there to give you a taste of the atmosphere in an airport in the aftermath of a crash, and to show you what it would look like for your family and friends if you had been on the plane. But that's what fiction is for.

I don't find this interpretation of motive very plausible. The job description of a reporter is to find out where news is happening and to show up there with a camera crew. That may not be the best thing in many circumstances, and I think taking pictures of grieving people sucks, but I reckon the motivation behind it, whatever the case, is the same: "It's my job to report a story in both words and pictures." They don't need to be, and probably aren't, thinking beyond that to a more cynical, overtly manipulative rationale.

I'm saying they're probably simpler than that. Follow the story, take pictures of shit. You could say the audience manipulation is baked into the cake of t.v. and photo-journalism. But I think people are overwhelmingly receptive to the idea of becoming emotionally involved in stories through pictures, and that that itself is the explanation for why the news media does what it does.

[Amor de Cosmos]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

To laverte's point, the photos are certainly there to give you a taste of the atmosphere in the airport. I don't know if that's out of line. But the whole "OMG...could be me" is surely your interpretation of their motivations.

I don't think so. All images portraying people are part window, part mirror to the viewer. The extent to which one is greater than the other is always debatable. However I tend to lean on the mirror (until it cracks!) We normally bring way more baggage to an image than it presents to us, and use it to make some sort of sense/meaning out of what we see. That's particularly so with documentary photographs. In this case, in myriad ways, each of us has felt grief, knows loss, and they will resonate first, and strongest.

[WOM]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

Alright, I can buy that. But that's a far more charitable interpretation of the same idea than laverne's, which I read as a more cynical glorification of grief to shift a few more papers. Grief porn, if you will.

[Amor de Cosmos]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

Sure. It's difficult to speak to motivations, especially when there's more than one person involved. In a story like this there'd be someone (photographer/cameraman) making the picture/video, choosing framing, PoF, etc. Then there'd be a picture editor (or someone in that role) deciding whether or, not to use it. Sub-editors choosing where and how, placement, cropping, etc., then deciding on captions/commentary. All have somewhat different motivations, both interior (what the picture means to them) and exterior, (what it might mean to their editor, employer, client.) Some will intersect, many won't.

[Guy Profumo]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

WOM wrote: You disagree with what?

I'm saying that a tasteful single shot of a couple is far from clickbait/grief porn. I'm not saying there aren't other ways to illustrate the story. But in the end, this is a story of people, victims and their surviving families. 'People shots' aren't inappropriate.

I disagree that any news source should impinge on what is clearly private grief.

Stand back. Walk away from it.

Even if it's happened in a public arena.

[Amor de Cosmos]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

Documentary reportage consists, in large part, of human tragedy, grief, and fear. Should we not have been shown this for example?

[MsD]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

In the case of war, and injured children, drowned refugees, we can call for it to stop, so there is the imperative to inform, to move people. An air crash is more akin to an act of God, I would say, so nothing to be gained from showing people's agony.

(Except that air travel does contribute significantly to climate change, so putting people off a bit might have a positive effect.)

[Amor de Cosmos]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

OK, but strictly by that logic, if the air crash had been caused by a bomb — for example — so not an act of God. It would then be OK to show grieving relatives?

[MsD]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

I dunno, I think it's still problematic, but in the case of the air crash, I can see no justification for it.

[Satchmo Distel]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

It's akin to showing physical injuries or corpses on the tarmac. Although the wounds of the relatives are psychological, they are no less deep nor less private.

Injuries from war or terrorism - sure, if there is a political intention to address the causes. Air crashes usually are freakish accidents, their cruelty lies in their randomness, their lack of explanation by fixable cause.

[Stumpy Pepys]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

Satchmo Distel wrote: Clickbait, grief porn?

Admittedly, I did have to crack one off, when I saw the pictures.

[Amor de Cosmos]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

A couple of points.

First — almost all non-commissioned photographs/films of people are intrusive to some degree. The rhetoric of the medium is laced with theft and violence — we "take" photos, and go on photo "shoots." Getting the "killer shot" is the photo-journalist's dream. It's naive to believe this hasn't influenced both photographers' attitudes and public perception.

Second — Images are almost always contextualised by words (con-text-ualised I suppose.) We rarely get the opportunity to look an image without simultaneously, or even previously, being told what we are looking at. This can lead to premature dismissal based on what we believe the circumstances to be. Sometimes the film-maker/photographer doesn't actually possess that knowledge, he/she is just trying to find something visually powerful in the moment.

I've got to go and feed candy to scary children now. If this thread's still active later I'll return. In the meantime here's a few documentary photos (with no text) that I think illuminate, rather than merely record. Which, IMHO, is what visual reportage ought to be about.

[Sam]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

I had a bit of a discussion on Twitter with an Argentine journalist acquaintance when the first front pages featuring Alan Kurdi started to come out. He felt it was unconscionable, and pure graphic imagery for graphic imagery's sake; I felt it was just the kind of powerful image many people in Europe especially needed to hammer home what was happening. He suggested a photo of some people on a boat would have been equally good to illustrate the story, and I was quite surprised that as a journalist (a sports journalist, but still a journalist) he didn't see how that wouldn't tell at all the same story, especially in the context of what was happening and how it was previously being reported.

Obviously the story and photos that inspired the OP are an entirely different kettle of fish to that, though. Does the line get harder to see, the more time you have to spend right up against it whilst trying not to step over? I wouldn't have thought so, but here we are...

[MsD]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

A photographer may seek to capture that killer moment. A responsible news editor doesn't have to use them.

[Amor de Cosmos]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

Of course. But if you were an editor what type of image would you have used to illustrate the Guardian story up top?

[Incandenza]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

Amor de Cosmos wrote:
I've got to go and feed candy to scary children now. If this thread's still active later I'll return. In the meantime here's a few documentary photos (with no text) that I think illuminate, rather than merely record. Which, IMHO, is what visual reportage ought to be about.

I can't figure out what's happening in the middle photo. It's a guy in a life vest. But what is that a photo of? Has he drowned?

[Amor de Cosmos]

Guardian Posting Photos of Shocked Relatives

He was one of the passengers on the MS Estonia which sank in the Baltic Sea (over 850 people died.)

The photo was taken by another passenger in the water on a cheap Instamatic camera. He wasn't trying to take a picture, just fired off several frames in order to attract attention with the flashes. He also didn't know anyone else was close by. The photo was a complete accident. The colour castes are due to water/light seepage prior to processing.

It's enormously compelling, even without the story. The terror in the man's eyes (created in part by red-eye from the flash) is palpable.