Photography and dirty propaganda?
Written by duckrabbitTonight I have followed Rabbit’s link to Jodi Bieber’s powerful and dignified photos of women in Afghanistan. I then went to look at the Editor of TIME, RICHARD STENGE’s, explanation of why he put the following photograph on the front cover:
‘Our cover image this week is powerful, shocking and disturbing. It is a portrait of Aisha, a shy 18-year-old Afghan woman who was sentenced by a Taliban commander to have her nose and ears cut off for fleeing her abusive in-laws. Aisha posed for the picture and says she wants the world to see the effect a Taliban resurgence would have on the women of Afghanistan, many of whom have flourished in the past few years. Her picture is accompanied by a powerful story by our own Aryn Baker on how Afghan women have embraced the freedoms that have come from the defeat of the Taliban — and how they fear a Taliban revival.’
The problem is that this editorial reads as if Aisha’s ears and nose were cut off before the American/UK invasion and therefore is a justification for the war. Infact the barbaric act took place last year. Despite this the cover states that the girl’s face is representative of ‘What Happens If We Leave Afghanistan’. But this is what is happening in Afghanistan now, after all the billions we’ve spent bombing the place. Some might say it’s dirty propaganda.
Much of my work in Ethiopia was related to women’s rights and the record in that country is as bad, if not worse than Afghanistan. Strangely the US and the UK take a different approach to Ethiopia. Instead of bombing the country every year they donate a couple of hundred million dollars in aid. It’s not always money well spent, but it sure beats bombing people as a way of changing barbaric cultural practices.
TIME’S editorial certainly makes for a great t-shirt ‘Bomb Afghanistan for women’s rights’, but I can’t see many behavioral change experts recommending it as a way to stop women being raped, mutilated or forced into early marriage.
Infact if you took all the billions we’ve spent on bombing Afghanistan and offered the money as payments to not abuse women’s rights (the aid way) then I’m pretty sure you would see change happening a lot swifter. The only problem is all those in the US and UK who profit from war would be a hell of a lot poorer and in this world their right to make money is the most important right of all.
I feel sorry for Bieber, she’s done a great job and cannot be faulted, but I feel this photo has been misused. Just as guns did not solve the problems of racism in South Africa, they will not solve the problems of women’s rights in Afghanistan.
Two Contrasting Responses:
Christine Nesbitt Hills
Jodi worked hard to create portraits that represent the women with dignity (see her audio interview on time.com). I believe she succeeded. I feel that the headline that ran on Time’s cover served to change the meaning of her photo on the cover. The text didn’t anchor the meaning of the image, it shifted the meaning, resulting in Aisha being represented as a victim. This is clearly not what Jodi intended or the message delivered through her photo. The meaning of the cover photo is now contested. Time’s editorial spin undermines the integrity of the relationship between photographer and subject. I also feel the photo has been abused, and along with it the subject and the photographer.
Tobie Openshaw
While I’m no apologist for war I think the point that the article makes is that under a resurgent Taliban, this sort of thing will happen MORE – that the US presence is (or was) at least keeping this kind of thing in check, that many “women of Afghanistan, … have flourished in the past few years.”
Author — duckrabbit
duckrabbit is a production company formed by radio producer/journalist Benjamin Chesterton and photographer David White. We specialize in digital storytelling.
Discussion (14 Comments)
While I’m no apologist for war I think the point that the article makes is that under a resurgent Taliban, this sort of thing will happen MORE – that the US presence is (or was) at least keeing this kind of thing in check, that many “women of Afghanistan, … have flourished in the past few years.”
Also can you please explain your comment, “Just as guns did not solve the problems of racism in South Africa…”? I’m not sure where that’s coming from.
Tobie Openshaw
Hi Tobie,
thanks for your comment.
What I mean is that in my opinion you can’t change someone by beating the crap out of them.
Jodi worked hard to create portraits that represent the women with dignity (see her audio interview on time.com). I believe she succeeded. I feel that the headline that ran on Time’s cover served to change the meaning of her photo on the cover. The text didn’t anchor the meaning of the image, it shifted the meaning, resulting in Aisha being represented as a victim. This is clearly not what Jodi intended or the message delivered through her photo. The meaning of the cover photo is now contested. Time’s editorial spin undermines the integrity of the relationship between photographer and subject. I also feel the photo has been abused, and along with it the subject and the photographer.
true. I hadn’t really thought about it like that. I just skipped quickly through the images without really thinking about the way they were being (ab)used by the magazine. thanks for pointing it out.
That aside, they are phenomenal portraits.
Working with a magazine like TIME (and the same applies to those other supposedly ‘liberal’ outlets, Newsweek and the NY Times) you just have to accept that your work will, in all likelihood, be misrepresented. It’s part of the deal – they pay you an insultingly low $500 day rate, and, in return, use your work to advance US foreign policy.
Time has never been a particularly sophisticated source of news, but since the advent of Richard Stengel and international editor Mike Elliott (ironically a Brit), the place has just been a cesspit of ugly Americanism. The real turning point was when they mawkishly anointed ‘The American Soldier’ as Person of the Year in 2003 – from that patriotic moment onwards they lost all claim to rationality and decency. Since then, pretty much every credible journalist they had has either left or been fired by Elliott and Stengel. Ignore it and let it die.
Spot on comments, including the reference to Nachtwey’s cover story.
When you put your into the hands of editors you have to trust that they have the same intentions as you. It is remarkable how often an article or a caption can completely alter the context and reading of a photograph and underscores the importance of a working relationship where respect and trust and paramount. It is a shame that there is not more collaboration in the industry between all the people who put an article together. I always thought that the writer, photographer, editor and designer should all be working together while the truth is that often the pieces are assembled without the input of the producers. A good editor is so important. I think this is the reason why many people are embracing the ideas of self publishing and distribution today, so they can have editorial control. Once your work is out there then it can be appropriated and used to further a multitude of agendas and it is near impossible to stop that, but it is also important that in the initial presentation it is put forward in the correct context. That way, you are not backtracking and having to say “No, what I meant was …”. You will have the context and be able to point to it directly as an anchor. My initial reaction to the caption on the cover was that it turned the photograph into a propaganda tool to support the war, rather than what I think was the original intention, which was to draw attention to the barbaric acts of violence perpetrated against Aisha and other women in Afghanistan. The idea that the war is justified and it’s continuation will prevent this from happen is a matter for debate, and is not a fact, as Time’s cover copy would imply. It turns the personal story of this woman into an archetypal illustration. That they focused on Aisha and not any of the other women photographed in the essay, which shows women in many different situations in Afghan society, many of whom are – for want of a better word – empowered, shows how far from the original intention of the photographic essay the editorial spin goes. It is very obvious that this essay is about women in Afghanistan and not about why the war should be sustained. It is fine – and important – to state your opinion, but it should be clearly stated that this is an editorial opinion and not fact. In this instance, you might as well replace the TIME logo with one for the U.S. Military. With that one phrase on the cover, TIME have shown themselves to be propagandists and not reporters.
To be so horribly abused, and then be so calluosly used, tells us all we need to know about either side.
If we go back to 1917,JP Morgan hired 12 high ranking news managers to determine the most influencial newspapers in America.This is to control generally the policy of the daily press of the United States.Those 12 managers were going to control 25 of the greatest papers.
‘An agreement was reached ;The policy of the papers was bought,and an editor was placed at each paper to insure that all published information was in keeping with the new policy”.
People involve are: Rockefeller,Warburg and JP Morgan.
Take care.
I was filled with anger and sadness as I went through Jodi Bieber’s photos, until I read Richard Stengel’s words:
“I would rather confront readers with the Taliban’s treatment of women than ignore it. I would rather people know that reality as they make up their minds about what the U.S. and its allies should do in Afghanistan.”
He ruined it. To me, he ruined the great job that Bieber’s had done to present the plight of Afghan women under the Taliban. Why? Because it sounds like a patriotic star-spangled delivery we see on The West Wing. It’s self-righteous and we recoil from that. The images would have made a greater impact without the verbose.
When I lived in the U.S. I knew some Afganistani women whose family had fled the Taliban rule in Afganistan. Most of these women came from relatively wealthy, educated, influential families. That was the reasons that they could escape and settle abroad when Taliban rule was imminent. Looking at the photos that Bieber has taken I can tell that many of these women are from the same sort families — with high contacts and connections. It is the same reason that Karzai got his job too. These are the families that have a far more protected existence and “freedom” if you can call it that — under the American occupation right now — and that’s what I see in Bieber’s portraits. But the Taliban is relentless and ruthless. It wants absolute power (like it did before). And it is the poorer women like Aisha who continue to suffer. But if you go back to what it was like for women before the U.S. invasion (where women could not leave the house without a male escort — that was the rule, even if they had an emergency) — I do believe it will be 10 times worse should the U.S. pull out and the Taliban take over like before. Because for them it will be payback time. And the ones they will first target will be the women (for violating codes of supposed “islamic conduct”). Most of the women — well dressed and sophisticated that we see in Bieber’s gallery — will pull out and find homes in Europe or the U.S. (like before) — but it is women like Aisha who poor, who have no where to flee. Can you imagine what would happen to Aisha — for daring to pose for a picture like this for the American media?
Some great comments above.
What a terrible shame for such powerful portraits to be embroiled in a strange form of patriotism and justification for war.
A massive paradigm shift is taking place: The U.S. invaded Afghanistan on the grounds of anti-terrorism which has failed, so the justification changes to a ‘liberation’ front. Thank God the U.S. and Britain are here to save the Afghans from themselves…
The Taliban are not the route of the problem. Poverty is the problem. Poverty beyond our imagination, bringing out the worst in the human condition.
Add to that that a whole set of acid mutilated women portraits came from Pakistan recently, a US ally. No war in Afghanistan is going to prevent these things from happening. To imply that is naive at best. War is maybe the worst strategy to do that, Duck is right.
Finally- TIME done right:
http://www.boingboing.net/2010/07/31/time-afghansploitati.html