Photography and Ethics

An exploration of some issues relating to photography, ethics and my own practice.

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Applying ethical principles to photographs - two examples

Warning: the images linked to from this page are distressing to look at.

"Pictures usually have more impact on people than written words. Their capacity to shock exceeds that of language" Eugene Goodwin, Groping for Ethics (1983)

In 1985, Frank Fournier photographed Omayra Sanchez a 13 year old girl who was trapped in debris following a volcano eruption in Colombia. The child could not be rescued, and eventually died of exposure.

Fournier won a World Press Photo Award for his image of the girl, taken just hours before she died.

In an interview following the award, Fournier explained his position thus:

"When I took the pictures I felt totally powerless in front of this little girl, who was facing death with courage and dignity. She could sense that her life was going.

I felt that the only thing I could do was to report properly on the courage and the suffering and the dignity of the little girl and hope that it would mobilise people to help the ones that had been rescued and had been saved.

I felt I had to report what this little girl had to go through...

I am very clear about what I do and how I do it, and I try to do my job with as much honesty and integrity as possible. I believe the photo helped raise money from around the world in aid and helped highlight the irresponsibility and lack of courage of the country's leaders."

Which philosophical principles might Fournier have been applying when he took the decision to photograph the little girl rather than roll up his sleeves and dig her out? He was almost certainly adopting a Utilitarianism approach - that is to say that reporting the loss of this life will be to the benefit of the greater good in the long run. (Indeed, much money was raised for the relief effort following television and newspaper reports of the disaster.) What is less certain is whether Fournier was operating under a Categorical Imperative: if, as could be argued, reporting the news is a universal duty, then his action was justified. If, on the other hand, the right to dignity and privacy at the time of death is considered a categorical imperative, then, unable to help, he should have looked away.

There are many similar examples. In 1975 Stanley Forman took a photograph of Diana Bryant falling from the collapsed fire escape of her apartment, her infant daughter close behind her in descent. There was a public outcry, but as a direct result of of his image, fire safety regulations in the city were reviewed and legislation tightened up.

Forman said of the incident:

"I was never bothered by the controversy. When you think about it, I don't think it was that horrific. The woman at the time was not deceased; we didn't show a dead person on the front page. She did die, which is a horrible thing. I didn't think it was that bad, but then I am the photographer, so I'm biased...

Any time there are stories about fire safety issues or issues such as those people went through with the hurricane in New Orleans, it wakes people up.

My photograph prompted people to go out and check their fire escapes and ushered in a law that meant that the owner of the property is responsible for fire-escape safety. It was also used in many fire-safety pamphlets for many years.

Thirty years later it's nice to know that I did the right thing."

Forman was apparently not disturbed by the fact that he took a photograph of a woman about to die. For him, Hedonism may well have been the driving factor: the potential scoop, the possibility of international acclaim. He almost certainly felt that there was operating under a Categorical Imperative to shoot regardless of any sense of good taste and decency. By disregarding the woman's right to privacy as she fell to her death, Forman gave the world a powerful and evocative image which at the same time panders to voyeurism and yet raises awareness of important fire safety issues.

References:

Goodwin, E. Groping for Ethics Iowa State University Press 1983

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