Photography and Tragedy

Sassine Street, Getty Images

On Friday, a car bomb exploded in Ashrafiyeh's Sassine Square, killing three and wounding around one hundred and twenty. I don't have much to add to the discussion of the attack - for good information go here or here or here.

I first heard about the explosion through Facebook when my roommate, at class in Gemmayze, posted about hearing a loud "boom" and seeing black smoke rise over Ashrafiyeh. Google News and Twitter told me the rest. I stepped out on to our balcony and looked down the street, and in the direction of Ashrafiyeh I saw only the still buildings and the brown haze that perpetually hangs over the city. Below me cars still swarmed from both directions, and people crossed the streets and gathered in small groups and went in and out of the various small shops. Back on my computer, I saw photographs from the scene begin to appear on various news websites. Burning cars, soldiers and firefighters and first aid workers, empty windows, shattered concrete, all the symbols of disaster. In addition to these, of course, are the photographs of the victims. Women screaming, a child carried over a rescuer's shoulder, blood and fear.

One of these photographs in particular was horrifying. A close-up of a woman on her back, one hand raised,   face distorted with some combination of pain and despair. The image is so close that we can see her neat, manicured nails as clearly as the deep gashes on her upper arm, welling with blood. It's a photograph of a woman at her most vulnerable, and more than just distressing in the physical fact of her condition it's distressing for the very fact of it being taken. News photography seeks to offer the illusion that they show the facts just as they happen, but the reality is that somebody hovered over this woman, jammed their lens not less than a foot or so from her face, and broadcast her terror and pain for the world to see. It's an invasive photograph, an act of voyeurism. I understand the need to show the world what's happening, to make people understand as best they can the gravity of events, but photographs such as this one seem in a way to fetishize the violence, so viewers can wallow in their sadness on the part of their distant fellow-beings.

My roommate is a journalist, and she told me that she avoided going to Sassine on the day of the explosion because she would have felt like a voyeur. Even yesterday, when the two of us walked around the area, talking to people and her taking some pictures, we both mentioned that we felt uncomfortable.

Storefront two streets over from the blast site

All around us were people replacing windows, cleaning their homes or shops, and I felt that pausing to take pictures nerve-wracking. Nobody said anything to us, or looked at us beyond glances, but it still felt intrusive.

Photography is much of the time an illusion, and news photography is a greater illusion than most. We see the scene before us and this can deceive us into thinking that it's a literal slice of life, a fact in 8 by 10. In viewing photography, we must never forget that there's a person with that camera, a person choosing where they stand and how they interact with the people around them. In the case of disaster photography, I truly believe that it is unnecessary and disrespectful to photograph people - presumably without consent, as I think few would stop a first aid worker carrying a bleeding person to ask if they minded having a photo taken - at the height of their distress. By all means, photograph the scene. Write about individuals. Writing is a better solution, I think, as it can be very detailed without explicitly revealing the identity of those involved or glorifying their pain.

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I've been asked what the situation here is, and I have two replies. First of all, I am not the best person to ask about the city- and country-wide situation. I suggest using Google News and Twitter to keep updated, as they have a variety of sources and eye-witness accounts.

Second of all, the area where I live has been quiet since the bombing. There are many shops closed, and last night a military vehicle was posted outside our building, but I have not encountered any of the road closures (through tire burning et cetera) that have happened in the rest of the city.