[Leica] Re: Political Correctness

[Simon Stevens <simon@camera-craftsman.com>]

Dear Tina,

If I might also un-lurk for a moment, your posting actually took me back
a bit to the mid Eighties when I was living in the UK trying to get into
a college photography program out of high school. One of the places I
applied to was the Polytechnic of Central London. I remember sitting in
the interview as a professor (like me, an American) sniffed at my
portfolio, asking dismissively where my photographs of gender politics
or the unemployed were. I replied weakly that I thought that
photographers should document their own environments as well as these
issues, in order to keep some balance in documentation  - the majority
being employed, etc. Of course, that argument when down like a lead
balloon and I was not offered a slot. Ironically I was myself unemployed
at the time. I was also just beginning to come to terms with being gay
but I said nothing about that not only because I wasn't comfortable
talking about it, but also because I considered it irrelevant. Being
cynical, I probably should have said something as both would have put me
into one of their weepy categories. :) Although I am glad I did not
study there, that incident left me with a pretty bad impression of much
of the photographic and artistic world and for years I avoided both.

More recently, and on a similar note,  I took a graduate level
anthropology course at Georgetown for my International Politics degree.
The subject was very interesting and the professor is very well known in
her field, but the scholarly writing of that discipline drove me up the
wall. It did, however, have its humorous side. In particular, I had a
lot of fun writing one of my papers with my tongue firmly in my cheek,
essentially lampooning the style by trying hard to say as little as
possible with as much flowery and sensitive language as possible. It
really was very fluffy with lots of adjectives strung together by
hyphens and of course, the professor, who apparently did not notice my
quiet little joke, gave me an A!

So my best advise is not to take 'em too seriously and to just take your
fine work elsewhere where it will be appreciated by people whose feet
still touch the ground.

Simon Stevens