The following statement is at the
Yahoo News website regarding the photos below:
To Yahoo! News readers:
News photos are an especially popular section of Yahoo! News. In part, this is
because we present thousands of news photos from some of the leading news
services, including The Associated Press, Reuters, and Agence France Press.
To make this volume of photos available in a timely manner, we present the
photos and their captions as written, edited and distributed by the news
services with no additional editing at Yahoo! News.
In recent days, a number of readers of Yahoo! News have commented on differences
in the language in two Hurricane Katrina-related photo captions (from two news
services). Since the controversy began, the supplier of one of the photos
–- AFP -– has asked all its clients to remove the photo from their databases.
Yahoo! News has complied with the AFP request.
Yahoo! News regrets that these photos and captions, viewed together, may have
suggested a racial bias on our part. We remain committed to bringing our
readers the full collection of photos as transmitted by our wire service
partners.
Neil Budde, General Manager, Yahoo! News
Screen shots of the "looting" photos on Yahoo News.
"Looting" or "finding"?
Bloggers are outraged
over the different Captions on photos
of blacks and whites
in New Orleans.
By Aaron Kinney,
Salon.com from the Web September 9, 2005
Sept. 1, 2005 -- Two photographs of
New Orleans residents wading through chest-deep water unleashed a wave of
chatter among bloggers Wednesday about whether black people are being treated
unfairly in media coverage of post-hurricane looting.
One of the images, shot by photographer Dave Martin for the Associated Press,
shows a young black man wading through chest-deep waters after "looting" a
grocery store, according to the caption. The young man appears to have a
case of Pepsi under one arm and a full garbage bag in tow. In the other,
similar shot, taken by photographer Chris Graythen for AFP/Getty Images, a white
man and a light-skinned woman are shown wading through chest-deep water after
"finding" goods including bread and soda, according to the caption, in a local
grocery store.
The images were both published on Tuesday by Yahoo News. "We don't edit
photo captions," Yahoo P.R. manager Brian Nelson told Salon. "Sometimes we
take a look at the photos and we'll choose to pull photos, but the captions run
as is." A search of AP and Getty's image databases confirms that Yahoo
News did not alter either of the photo captions before posting them online.
Looting has become a serious problem in the aftermath of Katrina, and conditions
in the area continue to be extremely challenging for everyone, journalists
included. Bloggers were quick to raise allegations of insensitivity and
racism regarding the disparity in the two captions -- but did they pass judgment
too quickly? Not only did the photos come from separate outlets, bloggers
had no knowledge of the circumstances in which the shots were taken, beyond what
appeared in the published captions.
On Wednesday, D.C. Web gossip Wonkette suggested the Associated Press should
apologize, while a blogger at Daily Kos commented alongside the juxtaposed
images, "And don't forget. It's not looting if you're white."
"I am curious how one photographer knew the food was looted by one but not the
other," wrote Boston Globe correspondent Christina Pazzanese, in a letter posted
on media commentator Jim Romenesko's blog. "Were interviews conducted as
they swam by? Should editors, in a rush to publish poignant or startling
images, relax their standards or allow personal or regional biases creep into
captions and stories?"
The AP database includes two other images from the same scene by photographer
Dave Martin that refer to looters in the captions, though neither actually shows
an explicit act of looting. Jack Stokes, AP's director of media relations,
confirmed today that Martin says he witnessed the people in his images looting a
grocery store. "He saw the person go into the shop and take the goods,"
Stokes said, "and that's why he wrote 'looting' in the caption."
Santiago Lyon, AP's director of photography, told Salon that all captions are
vetted by editors and are the result of a dialogue between editor and
photographer. Lyon said AP's policy is that each photographer can describe
only what he or she actually sees. He added, "When we see people go into
businesses and come out with goods, we call it 'looting.'" On the other
hand, he said, "When we just see them carrying things down the road, we call it
'carrying items.'"
Regarding the AFP/Getty "finding" photo by Graythen, Getty spokeswoman Bridget
Russel said, "This is obviously a big tragedy down there, so we're being careful
with how we credit these photos." Russel said that Graythen had discussed
the image in question with his editor and that if Graythen didn't witness the
two people in the image in the act of looting, then he couldn't say they were
looting.
But if he didn't witness an act of looting, how did Graythen determine where the
items came from, or if they were "found"? "I wish I could tell you,"
Russel said. "I haven't been able to talk to Chris."
"The only thing I can tell you is they don't assume one way or another," she
added.
Yahoo News published another photo Tuesday of a looting scene that caught
bloggers' attention. This one, by AP photographer Bill Feig, shows a white
man walking away from a looted convenience store, looking in a grocery bag,
while a black man jumps out of the store's broken front window. The
caption reads, "As one person looks through their shopping bag, left, another
jumps through a broken window, while leaving a convenience store ... in
Metairie, La." According to the caption, Feig shot the image while on a
helicopter tour of Louisiana with Gov. Kathleen Blanco.
"I think it's fair to say that he described what he saw ... which is somebody
going through their bag," Stokes said, affirming that Feig must not have seen
the man with the grocery bag actually leaving the looted store.
Both Stokes and Russel said their photographers would be unable to comment
further on the images for now, because of the chaos and poor communications
conditions prevailing in New Orleans and the surrounding region.
The stakes remain high in the aftermath of this disaster, says Pazzanese.
"Seems to me the national 'crisis mode' coverage of Katrina in a predominantly
black, poor part of the country presents a number of professional challenges for
everyone in the media around the subject of racial and economic sensitivity,"
she wrote on Romenesko. "Perhaps these photos will stimulate a media 'gut
check' as we race to tell the stories of the thousands who lost their lives and
livelihoods."
About the writer:
Aaron Kinney is an editorial fellow at Salon.
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