A few days ago I had my first difficult encounter. There is a family who lives in Erie that I've photographed a few times, and hope to do a story on them. There are two children and parents, but their situation and hardship effects on the family dynamic is what I want to story to be about. Their drunk neighbor didn't see it that. He continued to ask me what I was doing there, why I needed to take pictures, and then he asked me "Why are you taking advantage of these people? Stop exploiting the poor." I explained to him that I was here to photograph the family and their relationship, to deaf ears. He kept telling me that I was exploiting and taking advantage of people. He then told me that he was their landlord and to get off his property. Not knowing the family well enough to know who their landlord was, I left.
This is something that you hear journalist talk about, it was something I wasn't prepared for. In school professors talk about exposure and composition and where it is legal and ethical to photograph. I think learning to deal with difficult people can't be taught.
I'd like to say that I was uneffected, but I was sad. I never thought that what I did could be viewed as exploitive, that was naive. It still burned knowing that this wouldn't be the last time that I'm called exploitative or acused of using someone else's problems to further my position.
Here's hoping I'm better prepared for the future.
I hate this feeling as much as you do. I think we ask ourselves this question a lot, but explaining our point of view to other people (even drunken ones) is often difficult.
ReplyDeleteI find that asking questions puts some people of the defensive... "what do you mean taking advantage of? I'm trying to show the decisions these people are forced to make everyday, to portray them with dignity, to encourage others to identify with their struggle..." if he disagrees with this, that's his prerogative.
But, drunks usually have their mind made up. If the family is in strong support of you, maybe they can say something. If that hasn't developed yet, I would stay assertive and continue to find your story. When you've really grown close with these people, then I think you can resolve this landlord problem.
Good luck!
but i don't mean to sound like a ruthless zealot either. i've made the mistake of thinking I have something, started shooting, when I'm really just interested in people experiencing things very different than my experience.
ReplyDeletethe effect his comments have had could mean you haven't found your story yet
Neat video. Did you do all the production on it or did you have help?
ReplyDeleteDisregard that comment, I just saw the credits. Oops.
ReplyDelete