
OJ Simpson, the man who may or may not have killed his wife. The long-lasting trial, the glove that didn't fit, the mugshot. Oh, the mugshot, which one, the manipulated one, or the original? Newsweek and Time Magazine both published photos of OJ Simpson's mugshot during his trial days. Time Magazine just happened to shade the photo and darken it, no big deal, right? Well, no, it was a big deal considering the trial ended up being a black vs. white ordeal. Perhaps Time was just trying to show that a man was changing, that he was fading. The headline was "An American Tragedy" maybe they were trying to indicate that it was a good guy gone bad situation.
I'm sure they didn't intend on being racist or insensitive, though that is how it came across. It surely wasn't ethical, manipulating a photo without one's permission is never ethical, but it went too far, the photo didn't need any manipulation, it was bad enough as it was and they surely didn't attempt to improve it. There's nothing that can be done to make a mug shot better, and who knew someone could make it even worse, even more controversial. Changing a persons skin tone, or a key feature of this person that makes them original and unusual is not ethical though correcting a minor flaw or brightening a photo, or perhaps making someone appear more perfect is. But where do we draw the line? What if that one little blemish, or scar is what makes that person so original and unique and you just airbrush it away because it wasn't perfect enough for you-it's still only a minor change. It's complicated, when you try and improve a photo you may only be making it worse.
The way photo's are translated depends greatly on the viewer, it's not like text, you can't read it and understand immediately what it's trying to say or prove, you have to look deeper. If you're African-American the OJ Simpson may really offend you, but if you're simply Caucasian it would be seen differently, it wouldn't seem like such a big deal-maybe they're just trying to prove a point unspoken.
You can't believe everything you see.
Works Cited:
thelistuniverse. .. 16 Jan. 2008 http://listverse.com/history/top-15-manipulated-photographs/