Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2003/12/23
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Ted This all reminds me of the time I was arrested for taking pictures of the George Washington bridge between NY and NJ. This was in 1942 and I was 12 years old. They confiscated my Argus C2 camera and all the film I was carrying. I spent hours in the police station, and never got the camera back. When my father appeared to pick me up, they almost arrested him too, as he had a German accent! No, I did not demand any rights, as no one thought that we had any. Jerry Ted Grant wrote: > Leonard J Kapner offered wisely: > >> This "incident" was a non-confrontational, congenial dialogue about a > > > commonly-shared problem, and was resolved in a pleasant, respectful > > > manner. If I had become argumentative or defensive, I suspect the > > > situation might have turned out differently.<<<< > > Hi Len, > Well done, well done!!!! A perfect situation where you still succeeded > getting your pictures without pissing the officer off. It's almost > impossible to win a confrontational police situation. Why? > > They got the guns! They got the Law! They have the authority! Nothing is > gained by getting yappy and waving the "I have rights" banner as that only > pisses them off more. > > Far more is gained by being polite in a friendly manner. In other words more > things are gained with honey and cream than being a loud mouth freedom to do > whatever you think you have the rights and freedoms to do. > > Yep and sometimes you may well be absolutely in your constitutional rights, > whatever the hell that is, but getting all snotty and yappy is going to get > you nothing but a trip to the judge in the back seat of a cruiser. > > And yep they may well let you out the jail door 5 minutes later. But do you > know what? Even if yer right, you wont have any pictures!!! Be smart, be > quiet, get along because the ultimate goal is having pictures. > > I'll admit I've had to deal with severely intelligence challenged security > people of all stripes and I've ended up with teeth marks in my tongue to > avoid the fateful back seat of a cruiser where you see your competition > shooting the good stuff you could have had, if you only kept your mouth > shut. > > Look, if you run into a situation where you are told to move back, leave, > whatever due to the > " police officers think you could be in danger," that's only their opinion > not necessarily the truth. Don't argue, think smart!! Get out the 300mm, a > 1.4 or 2 times extender and look for a better angle, maybe higher up, any > shot that allows you to do an end run and come home with successful > photographs. But whatever you do don't argue!! It will get you nothing. > > The long lenses aren't just for football and photographing birds! > > The other side is, the yapping smart ass photographer giving the officer a > hard time is also giving all of us a bad name with the police, which inturn > produces a police attitude of "damn photographers are nothing but a pain in > the ass!" And the next time they have to deal with any photog situations, we > are on the bottom of the barrel before we even get a chance to explain what > we'd like to do. Don't argue and whatever you do.... "Don't challenge their > authority!! > > Yeah yeah I know some of you guys are going to come back about your rights > to freedom of the press, constitutional rights and all that crap! Trust me > you may have all the freedoms in the world, however shooting your mouth off > at just the right-wrong time is only going to get you an un-exposed roll of > film whether you like it or not. > > Len, a great job of handling a situation that could've been totally > non-picture time. Good on you lad. > ted > > "DOCTORS' WORK" Leica book > www.islandnet.com/~tedgrant > Ted Grant Photography Limited > > -- > To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html - -- To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html