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12/05/2012 10:37:34 AM · #1 |
Air waves are abuzz over photographer who captured an image of a man who was pushed onto the tracks, and about to be killed by a subway train.
Link to article
Note: there are no graphic images in the link at this time. Since it is an MSNBC web page, it is subject to update.
What do you all think? |
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12/05/2012 10:44:52 AM · #2 |
| I watched the photographer interviewed on NBC Today show. He should have stopped the photography of the event and raced to help. He may not have reached the person in time, but he should have tried. |
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12/05/2012 10:46:27 AM · #3 |
The humanitarian response:
Horrible, tragic photo - he should have tried to pull the man off the tracks
The practical response:
He said he was trying to flash the camera to get the attention of the train driver, while running towards the man. There wasn't much he could do. Of course, publishing the photo is where all of this gets sticky.
The photographer's response:
.. He missed peak action, no face visible, and composition could have been stronger.
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My response:
Why the hell didn't the idiots tackle the scumbag who did this? At least photograph the guy for crying out loud.
Message edited by author 2012-12-05 11:06:34. |
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12/05/2012 11:03:03 AM · #4 |
To me, its one thing to come upon a dead body, snap all you want, within reason, it may be distasteful, but it can't actually do real harm.
But here, as in life with all our iphone culture, and never being part of anything real because we are documenting the day and snapping photos,
put down the stupid camera and help out.
Some moral, ethical part of your humanity is horribly flawed when you snap photos instead of pull that guy off the tracks.
-and that video is too clear (of the guy who he argued with and presumably pushed him) for the cops not to catch that guy. Someone will know him. |
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12/05/2012 11:03:57 AM · #5 |
I've never understood people.
Last year walking down the Yonge Street, the major street in Toronto, I witnessed three teens/early 20s screaming at a homeless woman. The males in their accompany all had their phones out hoping to record the incident, they were actively egging the woman on to fight their friends/girlfriends. My brother in-law and I were on the other side of the street waiting by to see if anything would happen. No one else paid any attention to the situation, or so we thought. Just walked on by like nothing was going on.
Eventually they started hitting the homeless woman and we had to cross over and take over the situation. Two of the males tried to help their girlfriends to no avail. The irony was one of them kept tapping the entire thing even after we demo'ed five of them. Our saving grace was when the police showed up, there were witnesses who filmed the entire thing we weren't aware of rather then helping out the helpless person or us. Fucking pathetic if you ask me.
This situation is no different. Someone stands idly while they could have at least tried something, anything. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to get that once in a lifetime photo, but only if there's literally nothing I could have done to prevent the situation.
For those who don't know the Bang-Bang Club, you should look them up. Kevin Carter committed suicide soon after winning the Pulitzer Prize for this photo. If you read up on him, he felt helpless while on assignment in South Africa and he carried that depression with him until his early death.
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12/05/2012 11:11:10 AM · #6 |
| I'd be willing to bet that in most situations people would stop to get out their cell phones rather than stopping to help. |
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12/05/2012 11:17:38 AM · #7 |
I looked at the photo. I saw the headline yesterday, and wasn't interested in looking, but now I looked. In looking at the photo, I believe the photographer. I don't think there was anyway he could have gotten there in time. I'm not even sure that the train could have stopped in time.
22 seconds -- even if he wasn't zoomed in, he couldn't get there and pull up a guy in 22 seconds.
So then the question is this:
If you are a photographer, you see a situation where you cannot make any difference, is it wrong to take the picture? And was it wrong for media to buy and post the picture? It's news. It's horrible news.
(On a personal note: I think he should have taken one shot and then waved his arms madly and wildly. I'm sure the driver sees flashes all the time and wouldn't have thought twice about more. )
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12/05/2012 11:23:06 AM · #8 |
You know, just a reality check here for those of you who aren't regular liveleak viewers.
If the guy actually had managed to get there in time (not terribly likely, but possible perhaps), the chances of him pulling the guy to safety before the train impacted him would have been VERY unlikely.
When someone gets hit by a train like this, one of two things will happen, one is that they will be pulled under the train, the other is that they will get caught between the train and the platform.
In either case, there would be significant risk of the rescuer becoming the victim. Perhaps we should consider this from a practicality standpoint, and recognize that while it would have been the honorable thing to do, the actual wisdom of doing so would be really questionable.
Frankly, every time I step into something like this I end up walking away questioning my sanity, since I really have nothing to gain, and almost always stand to suffer significant loss. While I don't think I'll quit getting involved any time soon, I do have a certain amount of respect for those who have the sense to not rush in and get involved - it's certainly the "better" decision more often than not.
Dunno. I just think everyone is being pretty hard on the photographer... I don't honestly think he had a chance in the first place, and would give fair odds that we'd be reading about a double fatality today if he had tried. |
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12/05/2012 11:26:43 AM · #9 |
| Why did that photo need to be taken, what good will it do anyone besides sell papers? Why do people even want to look at those types of images? It isn't war photography, not riots, not anything that needed to be shown. The family of the man now gets to see him moments before death, alone plastered all over the Internet and media. Hindsight is 20/20 but if I am ever in that situation I hope my first instinct is not to start taking photos. |
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12/05/2012 11:27:17 AM · #10 |
One photo and a bunch of (mostly conflicting) eyewitness accounts, and we have enough information to pass judgment. I think not.
In the heat of crisis, 22 seconds goes by in a flash.
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12/05/2012 11:35:45 AM · #11 |
| if you are small enough you can lay down between the rails in a subway terminal. not sure if this is the case here, but at the terminals i have been to in Philly have areas that are deeper for drainage and i was told on multiple occasions by subway safety class instructors that its is a viable option if you find yourself in that predicament. |
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12/05/2012 11:37:51 AM · #12 |
| Dunno... but if i look at him posing as 'the photographer' i think he's a sack of shit |
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12/05/2012 11:45:55 AM · #13 |
Originally posted by bvy:
One photo and a bunch of (mostly conflicting) eyewitness accounts, and we have enough information to pass judgment. I think not.
In the heat of crisis, 22 seconds goes by in a flash. |
Just saying, the world record for the 200 meter dash is 19.19s. I heard the photograph say he was 100 feet away. Allowing for the fact the photog is not Usain Bolt, I think he had time to get to the man and lift him to the platform. At least he should have tried. He chose to stop and take a photo. It was not a humanitarian response. |
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12/05/2012 11:51:32 AM · #14 |
Everyone including the photographer was at fault for not trying to save this man.
He said he fired his flash 49 times, some say he was trying to get up for a minute maybe even 90 seconds. You can jog the entire length of the platform in 20 or 30 seconds maybe even less.
My guess is the photog tried to get a shot of a guy narrowly escaping dead and it backfired in his face. I hope he's haunted by nightmares of this for ever. |
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12/05/2012 12:02:00 PM · #15 |
OK, I have now watched the interview again and read the thread responses again.
We are not talking legal obligations, we are speaking of the moral and ethical obligations of photographer as bystander in this situation. In fact, he wasn't a photographer in this situation until he started snapping shots, so it was bystander turned photographer to be correct.
Some of his interview sounds like rationalization and conflicts a bit; close enough to want to lean back as not to be pushed or fall in, yet hundreds of feet away and better to try snapping pictures instead of jumping in?
When Hurricane Katrina happened there was a collective look at the slow response and death totals and Americans gasped at the the apparent disregard for the value of life as being somehow "thirdworld" right at home. This seems similar- right in our own NYC Subway. |
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12/05/2012 12:03:09 PM · #16 |
| Cut the guy some slack. The truth is most people in a situation like that will freeze up and fail to act unless they've been trained to operate under that kind of stress. So many think they will "rise to the occasion" and perform great things in those kinds of situations, but the reality is that people will sink to the level they've been trained. Most people are "trained" to respond in stress situations by staying out of the way, not by acting and getting involved. Haven't you noticed that people who do perform acts of heroism are typically people who at some point have had training that simulates those kind of stress situations, military, police, fire department, EMT etc? |
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12/05/2012 12:11:33 PM · #17 |
If I were in the situation and couldn't have helped there is no way I would have pulled my camera out. You can never unsee something and I would have looked away.
Haven't looked at the photo (and won't). Was there nobody closer to the man? Usually there are a lot of people on a subway platform. |
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12/05/2012 12:11:43 PM · #18 |
I haven't read enough of the matter to pass judgement on the photographer and question whether there is something he could have done to help. In the event that the photographer possibly knew right away he couldn't help, I question whether letting his photograph be published was the right thing to do morally.
This whole thing brings back memory of a situation I was in about a month ago. A guy jumped from a tower right across the street from my office. I actually heard the impact (such a strange horrible sound) and looked out my office window to see what had just happened. I din't see anything and went back to work. It was only after the fire department arrived and started dealing with the situation that I then noticed what was likely a body covered with a yellow plastic sheet in a planter next to the tower.
I feel horrible about this now, but since my camera was right there I started snapping some shots of the scene and playing news photographer. My office is 13 stories up and about 100 yards from where the man fell. So although I could see things fairly well I wasn't close enough to see the most graphic details. A coroner photographer started taking pictures of the uncovered body and I got interested in what gear he was using and so I shot some frames of that. It was only after I zoomed in on my lcd that I realized that with 280mm of lens and 21MP I really was capturing horrific detail (I had nightmares about what I saw). I immediately erased my memory card and then put down the camera. I was pretty hard on myself for even taking pictures in the first place. If I see something like this again I certainly won't.
So I guess I understand the photographer taking pictures on instinct since apparently that is his job. I just don't see why he needed to sell that image and have the victims family see it most likely. |
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12/05/2012 12:13:59 PM · #19 |
Hard to know what to think. If you read the 'tog's comments, he was running towards the oncoming train, snapping and flashing his camera as an attempt to alert the train driver. That would constitute "doing something". Even if he hadn't been snapping his camera, it does not sound like he could have reached the man in time.
I have more scorn towards the media, who are the ones encouraging voyeuristic captures by publishing increasingly graphic images. Vesner's story is a reminder that homeless-baiting is a sport now, with stupid people taking their frustrations and anger out on the less fortunate, and hoping to profit from the experience. |
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12/05/2012 12:14:08 PM · #20 |
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
...You can never unsee something and I would have looked away.
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Originally posted by Brent_S:
I really was capturing horrific detail (I had nightmares about what I saw). I immediately erased my memory card and then put down the camera. I was pretty hard on myself for even taking pictures in the first place. If I see something like this again I certainly won't. |
Looks like we had the same thought at the same time. |
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12/05/2012 12:23:43 PM · #21 |
| So long as the photographer genuinely believed there wasn't anything he could do I think taking the photos is acceptable (although I am a bit dubious of this), and on reflection it was the best thing to do in the situation, if anything it's evidence... what I do think is sick is the editor that made the decision to publish the image. I'm all for photos of death and misery when their aim is to achieve something. I actually wish it was easier to get many humanitarian/combat images published. Pictures change opinions and as a result change lives. This pictures however won't be changing anyone's opinion and it won't be raising any money, all it's there for is the macabre enjoyment of the readers and could be quite disturbing for the mans family and friends. The purpose of the picture is to sell papers and that is all. |
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12/05/2012 12:24:26 PM · #22 |
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12/05/2012 12:24:49 PM · #23 |
Link fixed
Message edited by author 2012-12-05 12:26:13. |
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12/05/2012 01:01:46 PM · #24 |
Originally posted by HawkinsT:
So long as the photographer genuinely believed there wasn't anything he could do I think taking the photos is acceptable (although I am a bit dubious of this), and on reflection it was the best thing to do in the situation, if anything it's evidence... what I do think is sick is the editor that made the decision to publish the image. I'm all for photos of death and misery when their aim is to achieve something. I actually wish it was easier to get many humanitarian/combat images published. Pictures change opinions and as a result change lives. This pictures however won't be changing anyone's opinion and it won't be raising any money, all it's there for is the macabre enjoyment of the readers and could be quite disturbing for the mans family and friends. The purpose of the picture is to sell papers and that is all. |
A suspect has been taken into custody. If there had been no arrests made, would it be more acceptable to print the photo? It certainly gets the public more interested in catching the creep who did it. But is that a good enough reason to have such a photo out there?
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12/05/2012 01:14:16 PM · #25 |
This is my train stop. I get off and on this stop everyday for work, so when I first saw the photo the next morning, I was bothered.
Anyways...
This is his side of the story... but more interesting is the video at the bottom of the article. It is the interview of the photographer that goes for 10 minutes.
Photographers Response and Video of Today Show Interview
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