[Leica] Photography student questioned by police after photographing brid gw

[scott at adrenaline.com (Scott McLoughlin)]

Wow, good find. I'd heard about this incident elsewhere,
but I hadn't seen the site.

I imagine it might be difficult to relate to police
harrassment until you've seen it up close. It's a
human conflict and abuse of authority issue, not an
abstract legal or political debate.

Two events in my student years drove this home to
me. First, I had a summer job as a waiter in Baltimore.
Working the evening shift, I walked home to the bus
with a black cook named James. All of a sudden, a police
car stopped. They pushed me to one side (I'm a preppy
white guy), but threw James up against the wall, dumped
his little gym bag right on the street, frisked James,
and then got back into the car and told us (James, really)
to "get out of the neighborhood" (we were downtown).

I was 20 years old and had never seen anything like it.
I called around, but with no badge number, nothing
could be done. James must have been in his mid 30's
at that time, and he was completely humiliated. It
was nauseating.

Second, I went to good old Harvard in the 80's. The
house masters informed us that Harvard had its very
own real police department and that if we were going
to do anything wrong, we would be wise to do it on
Harvard property, where the Cambridge police had no
jurisdiction. While I'm no historian, other students
told me that Harvard got its own police department
after the Cambridge police were stupid enough to
treat some Senators' kids like "common criminals"
during Vietnam war protests during the late 60's.
Whatever the history of the situation, the orientation
message to us students was quite clear.

In the Washington train station, I had a rather shy
policeman tell me I couldn't take photographs. I pointed
out that tourists were snapping away, so he said that
I couldn't use "real camera" there (Nikon N80, sheesh).

I asked why and he said that the train station was
private property. This man was actually very nice, but
clearly uneducated. I politely tipped him off that the
train station wasn't private property, and he was a
pretty embarrassed.

What to do? I didn't want to hassle this guy. I knew
he was probably uneducated, broke and frustrated (certainly
compared to me, at least) and just wanted to wander about
on duty and go home. He knew that I knew. In this case, he
ran somewhere and got me a phone number I could call to
get permission to use a "real camera" in the train station.
We actually parted almost friends.

I guess my point is that law enforcement seems quite
selective and, in my very limited set of experiences in
big cities where I've lived, it's exercise is heavily
mediated by class relationships and ethnic relationships.
And this is a real travesty.

I guess I'm pegged as a "priveleged guy," and I've been
quite thankful that LE has been there for me the few times
I've really needed it. In my own neighborhood full of
embassies and nice houses, I get really swift response
times and up-close-and-personal treatment :-)

But this photographer's story and a few of my own tell
me that for many citizens (a majority?), LE is *experienced*
as a bunch of lower middle class, poorly educated, badly
informed, potentially violent, harrassing yahoos wielding
guns and alot of authority. It's pretty scary.

While not regular police, I have a friend who works with
the TSA (airports), who really needs to leave for just
these sorts of issues with the TSA staff. The guards
actually regularly steal stuff and are generally belligerant
lower-class-with-big-chip-on-shoulder kinds of folks.
Again, that's pretty scary.

So back to photography, we'd all be happier if we were
served by a LE community of our peers, whatever that
might mean. I can imagine an effective LE that kindly
asks a few questions that I don't mind answering. They
might be educated and sensitive to the fact that many
photographers aren't so keen on new regulatory
policies. If we know that they know, maybe we can more
easily understand that they are implementing policies
they might well not agree with either. They might not
be biggoted, making sure to inconvenience well heeled
white folks (me) in kind with others to make the point.
Mutual respect might just be the order of the day.

Hell, I've had such nice chats with museum personnel
on the intricacies of their photo policies. A brief
conversation, but no conflict and still lots and lots
of photographs taken. Why not with LE?

Wouldn't it be nice....  Sorry for the long post.

Scott


Kyle Cassidy wrote:
> This is a nicely done website about one students experience with the 
> current
> anti-photography paranoia.
> 
> http://69.93.170.43/#
> 
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