Father. Photographer. Child pornographer?
Written by John MacphersonThanks to Markham Nolan @markham for the link to this.
Author — John Macpherson
John MacPherson was born and lives in the Scottish Highlands. He trained as a welder in the Glasgow shipyards, before completing an apprenticeship as a carpenter, and then qualified as a Social Worker in Disability Services. Along the way he has cooked on canal barges, trained as an Alpine Ski Leader & worked as an Instructor for Skiers with disabilities, been a canoe instructor, and tutor of night classes in carpentry, stained glass design and manufacture, and archery. He has travelled extensively on various continents, undertaking solo trips by bicycle, or motorcycle. He has had narrow escapes from an ambush by terrorists, been hit by lightning, caught in an erupting volcano, trapped in a mobile home by a tornado, kidnapped by a dog's hairdresser, rammed by a basking shark and was once bitten by a wild otter. He has combined all this with professional photography, which he has practised for over 35 years. He teaches photography and acts as a photography guide & tutor in the UK and abroad. His biggest challenge is keeping his 30 year old Land Rover 110 on the road. He loves telling and hearing stories.
Discussion (5 Comments)
Beautiful photos and a great video. In my opinion none of the photos in the video were even mildly suggestive; they were simply photos of a two year old girl being a two year old girl.
The larger issue is why so many of the people who thought the photos were pornographic don’t have real lives, and they feel the need to police the rest of society. The internet can be used for good or it can be used for bad. Those who are disagreeable tend to shout down and put down those whose opinions differ.
This is a real danger to people who do serious valid artistic work. I don’t doubt that at some point in the future, the verbal violence will lead to physical violence.
I agree Mikal. We restrict the boundaries of experience in our children’s formative years through the fear this type of ‘mob’ behaviour fosters. I applaud ‘dad’ for tackling it head on and responding so forcefully and with so much integrity. And, interestingly, the language used against him, when used as captions, loses it’s power and becomes something that elicits scorn for the person who wrote it.
John,
Your point regarding the captions is dead on; the captions show just how juvenile and simple minded the people are who excoriated the dad.
It is so hard… I can hear the notes before they begin “What about the sexual predators, what about the paedophiles…?” We have been cowed by the major news headliens and an highly survelliance-motivated police force to believe that every time we let our children out or expose them to anything online or physically and in real life, that we are leaving the door ajar for someone to take their innocence, or them, away.
I try to believe this cannot and will not affect me in my parenting decisions, photography involved or not. That is why the re-wilding of our children, which George Monbiot is a proponent of, is so important. They must, must, must, be allowed to explore and learn by themselves. Not be forced further into a closeted and closed environment where we spoon-feed them what we believe is safe for them.
Child behavior is a complex learning period. To not acknowledge that a child’s learning, and innocence, involves playing, touching things, people, themselves, is one reason I bristle at the religious term “original sin.” I refuse to believe we are all doomed before we get started.
It makes me hopeful, and has given me confidence, that Wyatt was able to summon the conviction to confront this rather than shying away from it.
Well said Ed.
The world presents more than enough ‘challenges’ to a growing child without us foisting this crap on them.