Bringing home the message

As an aspiring photojournalist, I feel it necessary to question, cross-reference and analyse the impact of the “image” on society’s perception of reality. More importantly, whether it has had the effect desired by those who risk their lives to bring the message home. In this blog, I am not interested in the validity of the product, only it’s effectiveness. I have presupposed the validity of such images (of which, none are fabricated).

The argument – ambiguous as it is – accomodates frantic debate: the still image has the edge over other mass media mediums – print requires a self-fabricated image to bring the piece to life, and radio, although allowing an arguably more thorough message, still doesn’t resonate in the years passed as a stills image may. There is however, a more recent medium – that of video. I will leave that out for the purpose of this blog as it will only complicate the matter.

Images – courtesy of Don McCullin, Robert Capa, Eugene Richards, Judah Passow and many many more – have instilled objectivity into my world view and as David Leeson says, “have softened my view on the world”. Surely, this is key to bringing home the message.

However, when watching a lecture recorded at the University of Berkeley in 2005, it left me dumbfounded and frustrated.

The lecture – Journalists under Fire: Vietnam and Iraq – featured my main photographic inspiration, Don McCullin. He is photojournalistic royalty and after reading one of his many photo-essays you will not only be moved, you will be inspired.

So then, when asked by the chair whether he felt he had accomplished anything, I was left reeling at his answer – “I ve been looking at other people’s dead bodies for 30 years now, and I feel as though it was all in vain. There are new wars every year. What has changed?”

David Leesson, a brilliant photographer and like Don, a humanist, responded in the most incredible manner. He unashamedly pointed out that McCullin’s work inspired him to not only become a photojournalist but to retain pragmatic morals and ethics – something missing from our lives today.

I am a firm believer that you cannot implement direct change immediately – it is simply impossible to mobilise a diverse society when morals and ethics are blurred . What you can do however, is affect individuals and their subsequent views in a more personal manner . Thus a chain reaction begins, with one passing on wisdom aquired to those around him/her.

To question the effectiveness of journalism, is to doubt it’s effect on you, and to do this is to undermine the message that people have risked their lives to distribute. After all, we have little else – if nothing at all – that matches the immediacy and effect of the still image.

If it can engage me, then it can you.

Also, it is not only conflict photography that is moving; I use it as an extreme example of photojournalism. Eugene Richards is a prime example that you do not need to be in a battlefield to compose extraordinarily emotive photographs – “War is Personal”

Eugene Richards

Don McCullin

Don McCullin

David Leeson

Judah Passow

Zyklon B: Devil’s irony

While sitting at a newsdesk, awaiting my fill of chaotic research, reading and – if I am lucky – typing, I stumbled upon the most interesting, if not mind-bogglingly ironic of features.

I am almost certain that few of us know little of Fritz Haber and his Noble Prize in Chemistry. It is not odd then, that more of us will recognise more aptly one of his creations – Zyklon B. Originally developed as an effective insecticide, this cyanide-based compound found fame, not in ridding crops of little critters, but of something far more sinister – exterminating a people.

Survivors: Auschwitz prisoners shortly after the death camp was liberated by Russian troops in 1945

My aim here, is not to draw out the terribly paradoxical irony, but to highlight the sheer demise of human value during the Nazi’s twelve years in power. It is indeed true that Fritz Haber, a leading German and world-renowned chemist was in fact Jewish; he fled Germany in 1933 and died of heart failure only one year later .

It is sickening to think that despite Nazi claims over racial, intellectual and physical prowess, they without conscience stole the genius of a jewish man, or “untermensch”. This can only serve to highlight the absolute flaws in Nazism and it’s obsession with eugenics; and this is to mention only one flaw.

Zyklon B resulted in the death of no fewer than 1.2 million people at Auschwitz-Birkenau and Majdanek.  This surely, is the “Devil’s irony”.

I discovered this terrible story through reading an equally shocking feature; Schaeffler, a now financially sterile German car firm, was according to historians. complicit in the manufacturing of textiles with the hair of some 40,000 Zyklon B victims.

Maria-Elisabeth Schaeffler, the current owner, at a rally near Nuremberg last month. She has admitted that the firm used slave labour during the war

Dr Lachendro, a historian at the Auschwitz museum has said that his analysis of the hair showed traces of the compound, corroborating claims that the firm was engaged more thoroughly in the Nazi Regime than they let on. All this amid an attempt by Schaeffler to receive a government bail-out.

My my, what a world we live in.

We British, the masters of moderation

It seems, that due to this country’s inability to deal with anything other than moderate weather, life in London had (on Feb 2) become heavily regionalized. The only way to travel was by foot, and that was far from easy – I fell no fewer than 10 times in the space of an hour. Walking is never normally a problem, but walking 2 miles to work on pavements, not suitable for even the most intrepid explorer, is far from acceptable.

With almost unanimous agreement, it is true to say that Britain has never experienced – what could be described in tropical or arctic regions as – severe weather conditions. But, February 2 saw the worst snow fall in this country for over 18 years, allowing us a taste of the continental European climate experienced annually by our neighbours. And how did we fare? Atrociously. In fact, the BBC reported that no less than £1bn was lost in one day as 1/5 of the population failed to make it into work – this figure will only rise further as the remnants of immoderate weather take their toll.

Why has one day of unaccustomed snow damned our already fractured economy? It is because, we British, the masters of moderance have failed to plan for anything slightly out of the ordinary. Despite repeated warnings, gritters were not sent out in time; the snow fell, the roads were rendered impassable, buses were trapped in their depots, public transport withered and died under such pressure and workers were unable to reach their desks.

My my, perhaps we should heed the advice of France, Italy, Germany etc, maybe we’ll learn something of use – at least it won’t cost us that much!