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And Life Goes On

Life Goes on 1

The Civil War in Syria rages on.  More than 100,000 have died by so-called “conventional means,” plus however many thousands more by chemical means.  Horrific images abound of bombs exploding, burned out buildings and vehicles aflame, child warriors, tortured and dead bodies, random limbs strewn about and more.  In some ways, however, the most disturbing images are not those that put the conflict on display in all of its goriest details, but rather those photographs that slip through to show a society that seems to have accommodated itself to the war as if it were a normal and ordinary event.

The photograph above is from the north of Syria near the Turkish border in the city of  Ras al-Ain.  According to the caption his living room has been “damaged” by an attack perpetrated by Kurdish militia and we see him rehanging a painting of Jesus Christ on his wall.  It would be easy to make a good deal out of the iconography of Jesus as we view this conflict from the Christian West, but there is a different and more subtle point to be made.  Buildings are “damaged” by storms and floods and earthquakes and fires; although there are exceptions, these are typically natural phenomenon over which humans have little if any control. Often they cannot be anticipated or predicted with any precision, and their main effects are primarily material and economic.  War, of course, is different.  No less physically disastrous than natural phenomena, its effects are as much psychic—if indeed not more so—as they are corporeal. Such psychic trauma is often difficult to see, marked usually in images of demonstrable grief or the now famous “thousand yard stare.” Or as in the image above, it can be altogether invisible, made to appear as part of the natural, ordinary business of cleaning up as if after a storm or an earthquake.  Yeah, sure, there was a mortar attack.  But now we just fix the windows, pick up the furniture, put the painting back on the wall and go about our day.

The point is driven home by the photograph below of a father and daughter making their way through the city of Aleppo on a cart. The caption says that they are in the process of

 Life Goes on 2

migrating from the war torn city. The physical effects of the war are present everywhere, from the rubble that covers the alleyway to the burned out bus stacked on top of another vehicle in the background.  But what makes the photograph so potentially disturbing—horrifying even—is that no one seems to notice.  The father and daughter make their way through the city without any sense of distress or particular attention to the ruins that surround them.  Others go about their business as well, apparently unimpeded by the physical destruction.  It is just another day in Aleppo.  Indeed, the young girl seems more interested in the person taking the photograph than anything else in her environment, a sign no doubt that she has fully incorporated the apocalyptic state of war into her consciousness as an ordinary and everyday event barely worth paying attention to.  The caption underscores the point, noting that she is “blow[ing] a bubble” as if to signal that she really doesn’t have a care in the world.

The real horror of war may well be the way in which those in its midst are forced to assimilate to its damage and destruction as a function of the sheer everydayness of ordinary life.  The real horror of war, in other words, may well lie in the ways in which its effects are invisible to the naked eye.  And that is what photographs can often put on display.

Photo Credits: Ras al-Ain/Reuters; Karam al-Masric/AFP/Getty Images

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Museum Photography: Syria’s Lost Civilization

There is an art to taking photographs of artifacts or artworks in a museum.  Think of all the images you’ve seen in photography books or magazines or newspapers–and how you didn’t even think of the fact that they were photographs–or of how those snaps you took with your camera didn’t turn out so well.  It takes skill to put art into circulation.  Even so, there is little reason not to take it for granted, and in any case photography’s most important museum is found outside the gallery walls.

A Free Syrian Army fighter takes position inside a house in Deir al-Zor

But not necessarily outside.  This dark interior contains no light of its own, as if it were a cave.  The weak shaft of light seems to have to bend to get there, as if refracted along canyon walls before entering this animal’s den.  The animal seems to be human, although his shadow looks like a rat, and that feral insinuation might be closer to the truth of his circumstances.

The caption says, “A Free Syrian Army fighter takes position inside a house in Deir al-Zor.”  One could almost say, “what had been a house.”  The place seems to be returning to darkness, to an inchoate void that soon will absorb everything there.  Imagine how much has been lost already.  Walls that will have been decorated and echoed with conversation and laughter now are pockmarked from destructiveness.  What had been a table or chair now is the soldier’s stepladder.  What appears to be clothing and other domestic goods are piled on the floor, thrown perhaps because they couldn’t be taken to a refugee camp, or so they wouldn’t be in the way of the fighting.  Whatever the story, it’s one of lives being undone.

And so we get to the washing machine and the window.  Each is remarkably salient, each has a presence as if it were something uncanny, each is both where it is supposed to be and yet dramatically out of place.  In other words, each now has the properties of a work of art.  The machine stands there like a surrealist found object, a machine of domesticity framed as a thing in itself, or perhaps as a historical curio–say, a Soviet capsule intended to send a monkey into space.  Such options are far-fetched, but compare them with the impossibility of the washer simply being what it was: a banal part of ordinary life.

And that window!  Was it ever banal?  Perhaps there are many like it, and on close inspection it looks like a machined knockoff of merely decorative designs.  But still, it is at once beautiful and so vulnerable.  You can’t believe that any soldier on any side in this street fight is going to hesitate to shoot through it the second they see a target.  And such a shame, as the stained glass and abstract pattern resonate across art history, sacred and secular, from Gothic cathedrals to Islamic calligraphy to modern art.  Of course, it was just a nice window in someone’s house, admired occasionally and ignored much of the time, but that’s how a good society works.  When ordinary life is well above the level of living in a cave, it’s because ordinary things are continuous with so many fundamental achievements in art, science, government, and the other arts of civilization.

If a tank fires, the entire room will be obliterated.  At that point, all that will remain of these remarkable works of art will be the photograph.  I’ve said recently that photography can provide an archaeology of the present: the images that would remind us of how close we can be to becoming ruins.  We could also say that photography is creating a virtual museum: a vast, continuously unfolding gallery of those things that are already becoming part of the past.  Ordinary things that are becoming precious, useful things that are becoming junk, sentimental things that now can only be the set up for irony.

This is the best kind of museum photography, precisely because it is there to document lost civilizations that still have a chance of survival.  In Syria’s case, much already has been lost to the darkness.  There is still time, perhaps, to find a way peace and the restoration of something like a normal life for the millions currently suffering from the civil war.  What seems to be lacking is a sense of urgency.  Perhaps it might help to take a walk through photography’s museum.  Take another look, and ask yourself if any part of the present is as secure as it might seem.

Photograph by Khalil Ashawi/Reuters.

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Conventional Warfare

Conventional Warfare 1

Much happened while NCN was on hiatus for the past three weeks, but no story seemed to dominate the news more than the debate over what President Obama meant when he drew a “red line in the sand” concerning the use of chemical weapons in Syria, whether Congress would endorse a limited military strike against Syria in the wake of its alleged usage of chemical warfare against its own people in Damascus, and what role if any would Russia play in taking control of chemical weapons in Syria.  There can be no question that chemical weapons are a dastardly technology of mass destruction; that chemical warfare violates not only international law, but every standard of humane behavior; and that the very existence of chemical arsenals dedicated to warfare, let alone their usage, demands vigilant attention and appropriate response from all nations.  This much is true, I believe, but for all of that the recent and almost exclusive emphasis on illegal, non-conventional chemical warfare in Syria has diverted our attention from a different and equally profound problem.

The photograph above was taken on September 8, 2013, right in the midst of debates about what if any response the U.S. should have the use of chemical weapons in Syria.  It is of the Salah al-Din neighborhood in Aleppo.  The caption describes the buildings as “heavily damaged,” but that seems to be almost euphemistic, as they are virtually destroyed, the road between the buildings all but impassable, the sheets and bus in the center of the image described as providing “limited cover from sniper fire for those wishing to cross the street.”  And the key point, of course, is that none of this was caused by chemical weapons.  These buildings—this city, really, since this is only one of numerous such photographs—have been torn apart by one or another version of explosive ordnance or what we might call the weapons of conventional warfare. And not just these buildings or the physical infrastructure of this city, for as the caption underscores and the photograph illustrates, the very social fabric of the city as a site of commerce and social or civic interaction—simply walking across the street—has been equally torn asunder.

We should not—we must not—ignore the usage of chemical weapons.  But we also need to be careful that our sanctimony here does not inadvertently lead us to forget that the state of exception that somehow legitimizes conventional warfare is ultimately no less damaging, destructive, or demoralizing.  And whether that occurs as a result of civil strife, as in Syria, or as a result of occupation or invasion as elsewhere in the world, the effect is no less devastating; indeed, perhaps in the end it is truly no less humane.

Photo Credit:  Abo/Mhio/AFP/Getty Images

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If it Bleeds it Leads … Sometimes

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Photographs of violent death show up in the mainstream media slideshows with some degree of regularity.  Not every single day, to be sure, but often enough to identify some sort of genre.  Such images don’t always include mourners, as does this one, which amplify the pain and suffering by extending it to the living, here a family member in grief, but they almost always feature the bruised and bloody body, often gruesomely so.  This image comes from Cairo, where the  government recently cracked down on supporters of the deposed president, Mohamed Morsi, but it could have been almost anywhere in the world, from Afghanistan to Chile, to Syria, Tibet and beyond.

The key phrase in that last sentence is “almost anywhere in the world,” because it is highly unlikely—approaching certainty—that we would ever see such a photograph taken in the United States and on display in the mainstream media.  Going back as far as the 1950s one of the very few exceptions I can think of is the photograph of the tortured and mangled body of Emmett Till, and that horrific image was put on display because his outraged mother insisted that the world bear witness to his lynching.  Another exception might be one of the photographs that appeared at the time of the slaying of students by the National Guard at Kent State University in 1970, though even there the most vividly gruesome images (here and here) received very little sustained attention, while a less  gruesome image went on to achieve iconic status.  And there maybe other exceptions, though I am hard pressed to identify them, but in any case they are so rare as to stand as proof to the rule of the convention.

The obvious question to ask  is why?  Why do we encounter such photographs from other parts of the world with regularity in the mainstream media, but not from our own world? This is not an easy question to answer.  Perhaps fewer such pictures are actually taken in the US, but that only begs the question, for while there might not be the same degree of concentrated violence in the US as elsewhere, there are surely enough occasions where such photographs could be taken and shown, but are not.  Or perhaps it is that we privilege the privacy of the individual in our own culture, but don’t allow privacy concerns to impede the ways in which we represent and depict alien cultures.  Or perhaps it is simply a perverse voyeurism that promotes our own culture over those we might characterize as “others.”  And there maybe other possibilities at well.

However we answer this first question, there is a second and, perhaps, more important question to ask:  Given the regularity and almost ubiquity of such images in the mainstream press, how is it that we see them without actually noticing them, viewing them all too frequently with a tired glance as we flip from one image to the next.  Just another photograph.  Some are no doubt content to answer this question with the old sop of “compassion fatigue,” but if that were true it is unlikely that photographers would keep taking the images or that editors would keep posting them with regularity, especially in slideshows where they are often surrounded with other images that don’t clearly address or inflect the violence that was perpetrated.  There has to be something else going on here.  I don’t know the answer, but the regular (commodified?) presence of such images of people from distant lands is surely a provocation to consider how it reflects our values and desires as much, if not more, than those of the people and countries being depicted.

Photo Credit: Khalil Hamra/AP

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War’s Assault on Civic Rituals

If you are having trouble making sense of the carnage that is spreading across Syria, Iraq, Egypt, and other fracturing states in the Middle East and Africa, just take a look at this photograph from Aleppo.

Syria fighter, football field

The smooth surfaces, sharp clothing, and crisp visual tonality make it seem like a movie still.  The surreal juxtaposition of that killer weapon and the athletic field might suggest a photo taken on a movie set, or one that was Photoshopped.  Camouflage pants and a polo shirt are a good combination when every day is casual Friday at the revolution, but even so this guy seems disturbingly out of place.

That may be why the movie allusion comes to mind, as the line between fantasy and reality seems to be evaporating, or as artificial and irrelevant as the chalk line on the turf behind him.  The exceptional visual clarity in the visual field enhances this sense of fabricated unreality: it becomes hard to believe that the gun is a real gun, or that he isn’t an actor doing take two.   (“OK, this time keep looking wary, but don’t look look at the camera.”)  Of course, he is in role but for very deadly effect.

The journalistic context assures us that the scene is real rather than imaginary, while the blast hole in the wall reminds us of the lethal potentiality at hand.  Even so, the primary value of the photograph is precisely how it capture’s war’s surrealism.  And unlike the artistic scrambling of texts and images, war’s destruction of ordinary conventions such as games and walls is regressive.  Instead of challenging a society to grow, it destroys the fictions and arbitrary distinctions that sustain civilization.

The regression in this image is that he is walking a foundational analogy backwards.  Instead of thinking of sport as a metaphor for war, we see sport being left behind as it is transformed back into war.  What was a playing field is now a war zone–really.  As he walks warily from the field into the space before him, he is walking back into a Hobbesian world of all against all, a world without rules, clear lines, or any occasion for coming together for anything other than a battle.

Sports are not one thing, but they certainly function in part as a symbolic substitution for armed combat. Civilization advances by transforming violence into less harmful forms of competition, and athletic competition in turn becomes most representative of that substitution.  Sports can be physical metaphors for warfare, and their rules are the most obvious example of how competitive passions can be regulated and how arbitrary regulations can create productive activity.  Being performed for spectators ensures that these lessons acquire high social status while being taught through participation in collective rituals.  No wonder one might wish the photo above were from a movie: otherwise, too much is being destroyed.

To make the point one more time, let’s look at the photo I was going to feature today before I saw the one above.

Chin Music

The caption said that Pittsburgh Pirates’ Starling Marte ducked out of the way of a wild pitch, but it sure looks like he has been shot.  That thought might come to mind because of the formal similarity with Robert Capa’s famous photo of the Falling Soldier in the Spanish Civil War.  Even without the allusion, the athlete’s bodily contortion and the way the bat has flown out of his hands suggest extreme duress as if he had been hit with a bullet.  And of course he is in uniform, surrounded by other uniformed comrades from both his side and the opposition, while the ball and the bat are like weapons, etc.

I liked the photo because it was visually dramatic, captured the athleticism and grace of the professional athlete in an unusual manner, and suggested that the conventional comparison of sport and military prowess wasn’t quite so trite after all.  After seeing the photo from Allepo, however, I realized that it showed much more as well.

The photo is a portrait of a society that continues to be very fortunate.  Sports are still a metaphor for war, not its backdrop.  The stadium is full, not emptied by violence so that those yet alive can cower in their homes or stagnate in refugee camps.  The lines are clear and the rules are followed by both sides, sectarian hatred has been transmuted into booing the ump, and heroes risk a concussion, not bleeding to death.  In this world, an image of being shot is only a trick of the eye, and one the draws on a heritage of visual forms in sport, dance, photography, and probably other arts as well.

It is a cliche now that truth is the first casualty in war.  We forget that it is not the only value at risk.  Ambiguity goes just as fast, and nuance, tolerance, patience, compassion, and many other virtues are soon under siege.  Consider also that these are part and parcel of the ritual forms for civic life.  The wars we are witnessing today may have lower death rates than seen in the past, but they are more vicious in their destruction of games, festivals, markets, holidays, and the other events that, we now can appreciate, should be included among the genuine achievements of civilization.

Photographs by Daniel Leal-Olivas/AFP/Getty Images and Keith Srakocic/Associated Press.

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Vietnam and Afghanistan: Kicking the Ball Down the Road

The slide shows currently are full of human interest shots from city streets, small towns, tourist havens, summer festivals, and similar settings where people can kick back a bit and enjoy life.  But for one detail, this photo could easily be included in the mix.

Afghan burned girl

A girl kicks a ball down the corridor of a hospital, reminding us that you don’t have to be at the beach to have a good time. The red ball is clearly out of place in the grey and white functionalist decor, and the pastel gown now seems a bit festive, adding to the contrast between her free spirit and the institutional setting.  What’s not to like?

The caption read, “8-year-old Razia plays ball at the U.S. military hospital in Bagram Air Base, north of Kabul, on June 11, 2009. Razia was evacuated to the hospital in May after she was severely burned when a white phosphorus round hit her home in the Tagab Valley, killing two of her sisters during fighting between French troops and Taliban militants.”

And so we get to her face.  That, and not the 2009 date is the reason this photo isn’t a human interest story.  But why bring it up now?  2009 was, well, a long time ago, and isn’t the US pulling out of Afghanistan, or something like that?

The basic reason I’m writing about the photograph now is that none of us are likely to have seen it earlier.  Fortunately, Alan Taylor at In Focus apparently thought that August shouldn’t be devoted entirely to forgetting about the rest of the world.  This image is part of his current retrospective on Afghanistan’s Children of War.  Some viewers may find it inappropriate–say, because it might invoke pity, or exploit the child or childhood, or suggest that the US cares for the war’s victims as much as it might harm them.  Those reactions may be worth discussing, but I want to go back a step and ask why the image was not seen previously or regularly and widely in the first place.

More to the point, why has it not played a part in public discussion of the war in Afghanistan, despite its similarities to another photo that continues to be a flash point for debate about the Vietnam War?

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You will recognize this iconic image of Kim Phuc and other children running from a napalm attack.  Obviously, the photos are not identical.  The girl in one photo is naked, while in the other she is fully clothed.  One is alone in a safe place, while one is part of a traumatic event whose shock waves are still reverberating through others in her family.  Combat soldiers are bringing up the rear in Vietnam, while we see what appear to be medical personal in Afghanistan.  Oh, and one is burned on her face (at the very least), while the other is burned on her back and arm.  And one was burned in June and the other in May. . . . Very different images, right?

Well, not exactly.  Napalm then, phosphorus now.  The girls were about the same age at the time.  Both had siblings killed in the attack that wounded them.  The attack in each case was by US proxies.  Both attacks were hardly unique, but rather examples of what had become all too common occurrences.  And the wars. . . . .

John Lucaites and I have written a fair amount about this iconic image (see chapter six of No Caption Needed), so let me be very clear that I don’t think one can explain exactly why some photos acquire iconic status and others don’t.  John and I identify many possible factors, but the outcomes can depend on many accidents of history.  That said, it still is fair to raise the question of why a burned girl was major news then and not now.  One very bad answer is that the public is experiencing “compassion fatigue”:  as David Campbell has argued, this is a myth of media influence rather than a real problem of public responsiveness.

I would argue that the first photo both hampers emotional response while also lacking some of the other important features of iconic composition.  To put the matter very simply, her playfulness complicates one’s reaction to her injury, while cues for public significance are missing due to the dominance of the hospital setting.  By contrast, the soldiers, family, and road are important elements for framing the naked girl’s suffering, which is being voiced.  Thus, the difference in uptake may be due to important differences in the photos themselves.

But still.  I have to think that something else is involved.  Something like compassion fatigue, perhaps, although neither merely emotional nor a myth.  Too many people have simply gotten used to not paying attention, to accepting what are essentially colonial wars as business as usual, to not caring in the first place what happens over there.

The military learned a lot from Vietnam.  The American public, not so much.

Photographs by Rafiq Maqbool/Associated Press and Nick Ut/Associated Press.

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Seeing Shooting

We usually see the aftermath: the wounded and those tending to them, or the dead and those reacting in shock and grief.  Also people running to escape, or broken windows and overturned trash cans, or blood on the ground, or police tape and investigators, or teddy bears and flowers at the makeshift memorials.  But we don’t often see the shooting.

Riot police fire rubber bullets at demonstrator during clashes near Guanabara Palace in Rio de Janeiro

Tear gas and rubber bullets probably are the most common examples of the shooting that we do see.  Their supposedly non-lethal nature guards against press qualms about violating norms of appropriate public content, while the implication that the state is exercising restraint in its use of force always plays well with the regime.

But sometimes more than the usual amount of truth gets through the screen.  This photo of riot police firing rubber bullets at demonstrators in Rio de Janeiro last week reveals key features of what is standard operating procedure around the globe: The police are having a turkey shoot, they  are in no real danger themselves, and they are enjoying their work.  Why shouldn’t they?  Heavily armed and armored though facing civilians, exempt from criminal prosecution though aiming to harm, finally getting to unload on those privileged scum who would rather whine than work for a living; damn, this is about as good as it gets.

Even so, they still are police, and the bullets are rubber, and they are reacting to a civil demonstration rather than a civil war.  To see the difference, take a look at this.

APTOPIX Mideast Egypt

Here we were told only that a man is firing his weapon during clashes between opponents and supporters of Egypt’s ousted President Mohammed Morsi.  As with many captions, that is a bit of an understatement.  One can fire’s one’s weapon at a firing range, but this guy is aiming, and very likely at another human being.  I also have to wonder just what “man” hides, as that looks like a trained firing stance.  He looks a bit old for active service, but the training is still there.  And like the goons above, he isn’t firing in self-defense; the tree is being used for support rather than as a barricade, and the children and other bystanders seem to think they are in no danger.  If that is so, then there also would be little need for a warning shot.  No, this guy probably is a cold-blooded killer.

And you don’t often get to see that.  But there it is, and there is a lot of it going around–in Egypt, Syria, Somalia, you name it.  Worse yet, it seems to have become a part of ordinary life in too many places.  Which may be why we are more likely to see it.  I’d like to think that something else could happen: that by seeing what it is to aim and fire a gun at another person, we would realize exactly how much humanity itself is under siege.

Photographs by Pilar Olivares/Reuters and Hussein Malla/Associated Press.

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War and Representation: Showing the Limits of Comprehension

There’s been a lot of talk lately, including a post at this blog, about accuracy in photojournalism: How much can a photograph be adjusted artistically and still be considered true?  How much detail should the captions provide, and in respect to what questions or values?  Despite strong and often heated disagreements, most commentators across the spectrum seem to assume that the reportage could be thoroughly accurate, specific, relevant, and otherwise up to the task of giving the public what they need to form sound judgments about current events.

Let me now suggest that sometimes we are better off without that assumption.  More to the point, one of the jobs that photojournalism also has is to remind the public how much eludes understanding.  Thus, some of the photos (and their captions) are good journalism because of how they show us the limits of what can be seen.

SYRIA-CONFLICT

The caption at Time said, “May 13, 2013. Syrian army soldiers take control of the village of Western Dumayna, some seven kilometers north of the rebel-held city of Qusayr.”  The “seven kilometers” suggests that we are being given a precise description of what is happening, even though you can’t see any of that fact in the photograph.  Many viewers might feel adequately anchored at that point and so look a moment longer and then move on.  But wait a minute: is this an image of “control”?

Horrific flames and dark, thick smoke billow from the other side of the wall.  The open doorway reveals only blackness, as if a void lies within.  A swatch of fire has dropped on the outside of the wall, near which a lone soldier is about to enter through another doorway into the interior.  The soldier is controlled, disciplined, brave, and probably used to working amid the roiling destructiveness of battle, but he also is a marginal figure in the composition and appears almost furtive as he enters what is effectively the back stage of this set.  Set in diminutive contrast to the powerful flames, he can’t be the locus of control.  Likewise, additional reportage (the full caption not included at Time) tells us that a Syrian advance had gained a strategic advantage and cut supply lines in Qusayr, but that larger sense of command and control also is not evident here.  In fact, this image seems to be very much a picture of something closer to chaos.

And that may be the point.  I’d say this photograph shows just how “control” is an abstraction that is imposed on the material destructiveness of war.  Being abstract doesn’t mean it isn’t real, but it does mean that it depends on a certain distance from the flames.  Likewise, describing the battle in terms of control is of course very much to the point of the fighting, but it also encourages denial of just how terrible life can become on the other side of that wall.

Seen in this light, the wall now assumes a double meaning.  It is still a structure about seven kilometers north of Qusayr, but it also can be a symbol of how the truth of the matter on the ground might lie forever behind a barrier.  Walls stop vision, and here it seems that the action that really counts lies on the other side of that thick, stony, silent wall.  This is not just a blockage, however, but a reminder of how vision and with that understanding is always partially blocked.  This wall now speaks eloquently of the limits of our understanding: we no more understand the battle than we did when we were told that it was about “control,” but now we have a visual emblem of that limit on our comprehension.

In marking how war can exceed representation, the image also can say something about this war.  Readers of a certain age will recall the infamous statement that “we had to destroy the village in order to save it.”  One can’t help but wonder if the same holds for Syria, which is being laid waste.  If we can’t see a reason for the destructiveness, it could be because one no longer is there.  As Suzy Linfield has said, violence today too often becomes untethered from any ideological rationale and political administration.  The result is not something that later can be honored as justified sacrifice for the nation or the cause, but only awful cycles of violence that burn through civilians like firewood.

Thus, by recognizing how this war exceeds our understanding, we also can consider how that is not merely a failure of perception.  War itself may lie hidden behind that wall.  Raging destructiveness without purpose or limit, fueled by ignorance and protected by abstraction, it can lure anyone to cross that threshold, only to devour them in the darkness.

That compact with oblivion is all the more reason to supply as many photographs and words as one can to show what must be shown.  But it is equally important to remember that none of us can fully know the truth, and how war can count on that.  That is no reason for despair, however.  Even when at the limits of comprehension, the ideal of peace is always on the horizon, waiting for those who will start walking in that direction.

Photograph by Joseph Eid/AFP-Getty Images.

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When the Boston Bombing Happens in Iraq

Nothing that I’m about to say is intended to make light of the terrible bombing in Boston on Monday.  Nothing.  And I’m not really going to talk about Boston; after all, what needs to be said that hasn’t been said?  Neither words nor pictures are needed to depict the carnage, the splendid response by both first responders and ordinary citizens, or the sorrow, anger, and other emotions still swirling through the city and the country.

There is need, however, to learn what one can and to share it with others.  This may not be the best time to say it, but it’s the time I’ve got.  My point is simple: what was a unique, unexpected, unjustified, traumatic event in the US is something that is happening all the time in Iraq, and as a direct consequence of the American invasion and occupation.

The New York Times reported in 2011 that suicide bombings had by that time killed over 12,000 civilians in Iraq, while over 30,000 had been wounded.  Imagine, if you can, more than 12,000 dead.  That is the three deaths from Monday multiplied by 4000, as if you had a Boston Marathon bombing every day for 11 years, and all that in a country with a smaller population than the US.   And it didn’t stop n 2011.  On the same day as the marathon, the Times reported that bombings were increasing again, including “more than 20 attacks around the country on Monday” that “killed close to 50 people and wounded nearly 200.”

That’s bad, but it’s also just another day in the news for most readers of the Times.  To really get a sense of the difference that I’m talking about, take a look at the photo that accompanied the Times story.

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Compare this inert photo of car bombing in Baghdad with any of the images from Boston being circulated through the US papers.  Two burned out cars are the center of the inaction, while kids and adults stand around as if wondering how to salvage a part of two. The image has all the emotional urgency of a junkyard, and no wonder: there is no trace of the dead and wounded, while those in the scene appear to be bored rather than acting as if they were in any danger.

The casualness and indifference of those standing around the metal carcasses suggests that this scene is merely a waning curiosity.  It is a portrait of past violence, but violence that is unexceptional.  Cars get blown up, just like they get into other accidents.  Showing only damage to property, lacking pain, suffering, or any other emotional intensity, and suggesting that those at the scene are without any risk of being harmed themselves, this is what happens when a disaster is coded as an event that is not an emergency.

I don’t fault the coverage of the Boston bombing for doing everything differently: for showing suffering, action, anguish, and much more.  And earlier in the war in Iraq there were photos, including some award winners, that did communicate the violence and terror that was brought down hard on the people living there.  That’s what should be happening.  But what also has happened is that the US has from the start abandoned large civilian populations to the horrors of war, and now too often the coverage of the continuing violence presents it not as a dramatic disaster requiring an extraordinary response, but rather as just another day in the life for those accustomed to living in a war zone.

The photos from Boston all scream EMERGENCY.  They insist that this event is unique, exceptional, and deserving an immediate and comprehensive response.  Like the pronouncements by the President and other public officials, they all demand justice for the innocent citizens cut down by a brutal terrorist attack.  As Ariella Azoulay would say in The Civil Contract of Photography, they have made the suffering of those citizens into a political object: that is, an object of collective concern that mandates state action.

The photo from Baghdad, by contrast, says that nothing happening is that much out of the ordinary.  There is no emergency claim.  Any suffering is offstage or abstract and it falls short of meriting a specific political response.  The fact of violence is being shown, yet the moral and political context remains largely invisible.

Thus, the photo inadvertently captures the real condition of those living amidst the violence in Iraq: they have been relegated to the condition (again, in Azoulay’s terms) of living on the verge of catastrophe.  Neither being systematically sacrificed nor adequately protected, they are abandoned to a bare life of continuing, “low-level” violence.

It shouldn’t be surprising that one response of those trapped there is to treat bombed cars as a part of life.  But the rest of us might take a moment to realize that all the horror experienced in Boston really is happening elsewhere, and much, much more often.  Perhaps we can take a moment while our own hearts are torn to better understand how much others have to endure.  And to recognize that the insanity will stop only when there is more solidarity among those who are suffering.

Photograph by Mohammed Ameen/Reuters.

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