Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1999/09/21

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Subject: Re: [Leica] Photo Vultures (didtoday,getalife) [no Leica]
From: Eric Welch <ewelch@ponyexpress.net>
Date: Tue, 21 Sep 1999 10:22:00 -0500

At 09:38 AM 9/21/99 -0500, you wrote:
>Now, the vulture thing; clipping liberally from an Eric Welch contribution:
> >He looked pretty much like he was going to die. No response from
> >him, his hand was limp when the paramedic raised and dropped it.
>Limp limbs are not an indicator of pending expiration.
>Thank goodness for that. Or many 'dead drunks' would end up interred.

Non-responsive is good indication of a lack of brain function, and the fact 
that his head bounced off a pickup fender at 30 miles per hour, and that 
his pupils weren't dilating, and his breathing.... you get the point. That 
wasn't the only indicator. It talked to the paramedics. You want my posts 
to be longer????

> >his mother stepped in front of me and said "I don't want a picture of him in
> >the paper." She was obviously in distress, and not thinking clearly...
>1st; telling you this was sufficient to make you stop. Legally, you are
>bound to comply with the request (which is not about the 'taking' of the
>photo, but the use of it afterward). 2nd; if she was thinking clearly she
>would have realized this was her sons' 15 minutes of fame?

You are completely and TOTALLY wrong. On both points. Number one, legally, 
not even the police can stop me from photographing. Though a billy club 
will do nicely. Her request has no legal weight. At least here in the 
states. As for his 15 minutes of fame, the photo yes or no, he's going to 
be known as the kid who bounce off a pickup and the newspaper kept the 
community informed on his progress 'til he came home. Oh yeah, that's one 
of Anthony's negative points. Bad news folks, he lived!

> > I indicated that if he wasn't all right in the end, we wouldn't run the 
> photo
> >anyway...
>So your paper draws the line on certain content? Like, 'no dead people'?
>Dismemberment, maiming, general carnage okay. Or, 'if it bleeds, it leads'?
>Let's hear it for your street side manners too, "If your boy dies we won't
>run the picture lady." Probably was very reassuring to her at the time....

I didn't say that. And we have a policy, no dead people in the paper, even 
if they're alive when the photo was taken. Your sophistry on this point is 
amazing. Our job is to tell the news. If that photo will make other kids 
think about safely riding their bikes, if only one does, then I've done my 
job. We don't do wrecks and carnage for the joy of it. Readers don't like 
it. But we do it in exceptional cases, because it calls attention to a problem.

>You also don't have to subject anyone to rude behavior just because they
>happen to be in public. No means no. Overstep that boundary, that then could
>be considered assault. What happens after that is photographers fault.\

You have to be there. You are making a lot of assumptions, and passing 
judgements without seeing what I said or did. I admitted I didn't say what 
I meant perfectly, but it was hardly the insensitive thing you imply. It's 
not an easy job. The balance of what is necessary to do the job is 
something one has to weigh on the job, not from the comfort of a judgmental 
computer terminal. Whether she wants a photograph taken or not is 
immaterial. How I do it is. I handled that one pretty good, and if you 
can't see it, too bad. But accusation that what I did was assault is, as I 
say, sophistry.



Eric Welch
St. Joseph, MO

http://www.ponyexpress.net/~ewelch

Consciousness: that annoying time between naps.