How Photojournalism Shows Us What We Really Are: Fragile Humans

Mexican film director Guillermo del Toro once said, “Horror makes us human because it reminds us of our imperfection”. While referencing the blood and gore associated with the horror movie genre, del Toro’s point has farther reaching implications regarding our relationship with documentation of the morbid, whether it be a work of fiction or not. Photojournalism is innately graphic. Raw images of cities pillaged, burn, and littered with dead bodies are a brash reminder of our mortality and fragility. We are, in fact, vincible. 2015 feature photography Pulitzer prize winner Daniel Berehulak captures this reminder wonderfully, in his photo of a Liberian man leaning over the grave of his late mother, who died as a result of the 2015 Ebola outbreak in West Africa. His image is significant in that it forces the viewer of the image to contemplate and acknowledge mortality. The photo contains stark contrasts in color of brown and green hues. The lively untamed greenery is what first draws in the eyes of the viewer. This representation of flourishing unapologetic plant life is fiercely juxtaposed by the fact that the mounds of brown dirt are the graves of those who have died as a result of the Ebola outbreak. The reminder that we are alive and therefore also inevitably going to die, is subliminally packed into one image.

In her book, The Cruel Radiance: Photography and Political Violence, Susie Linfield highlights how photojournalism shows us what we really are: fragile humans. “Far from dulling our senses, photography has been a key component in the creation of what rights theorist Mary Kaldor has called “our growing consciousness of what it means to be human,”. The frustrating and uncomfortable mortality paradox is what it means to be human. While some may feel the goal of photojournalism is to photograph the atrocious, hoping to dredge up enough empathy for those depicted so gruesomely, and enough outrage that what’s being portrayed in an image never happens again, coming to terms with the mortality paradox and confronting it is, in the long run, more beneficial to the world in regard to righting its wrongs. The reminder of death is what pushes and inspires us to make the most of the time we have left. This means deepening connections with those around us, and motivation to create more, do more, and love more. While doing these things doesn’t fix the institutional and deeply systemic problems that lead to the atrocity depicted; specifically, a deadly outbreak that a government doesn’t have the capacity to control before it takes the lives of millions, it does make the world a better place for those around you and that, in and of itself, minutely makes the world a little bit better.

Berehulak’s photo begs you to take a second look. At first glance, one may think they are looking at a farm due to the elements of the photo, but when one looks again you notice two of the headstones are in focus, which clarifies for the viewer they are in fact looking at someone’s final resting place and not a farm. More troubling, is the idea that farms are places meant to grow and birth things, but when you look closer at this photo it is indeed the exact opposite. The rest of the headstones are purposely out of focus, to show you that in life, we all may have things that differentiate and distinguish us from one another, but in death we are all the same. We all have this paradox in common. Every headstone looks like the one next to it. It doesn’t matter if you are from a wealthy country, or a foreign one that doesn’t have the government capacity to control an outbreak; death, and the consequent suffering that comes with it, does not discriminate.

In the words of Linfield, “…photographs bring home to us the reality of physical suffering with a literalness and an irrefutability that neither literature nor painting can claim,”. While one may find it hard to empathize with a tragedy another world away, therefore making it hard to mobilize aid; this photo emphasizes that mortality complex that we all have in common. A complex that disturbs us enough to want to love and care harder, before we too are gone. This is significant on a large scale. It is characteristic of Western culture to want to sweep reminders of death under the rug: but being forced to confront mortality is a push in the right direction, a direction where we are brought closer together with those around us.

The photos or news stories that make us want to go out and hug our loved ones a little tighter are not the ones depicting happy and cheerful events, but rather, the ones bearing images of sadness and death.To look too long at a photo of a man having a private and emotional moment at his mother’s gravesite, feels too much like gross voyeurism. We want to look away, yet, we cannot. The photo takes it a step further by making the man the center of the photo. The man is just as alive as the overgrown leaves and trees around him, and he is also wearing a shirt of a brazenly green color, which in this photo is the color of life. The man’s features are also unidentifiable, which goes to show how, in the presence of death (which is overwhelming in this photo), no one is unique. The lighting and overall hues of the photo are very dreary, which sets the tone for the very depressing photo.

This image gets the viewer thinking about something they would rather not, forcing them to acquaint themselves with the uncomfortable. The power of this photo breaks through the barrier that is blissful ignorance. “Today it is, quite simply, impossible to say, “I did not know”: photographs have robbed us of the alibi of ignorance,”. Linfield is correct in this assessment; this photo of human pain and emotional suffering forces you to confront the most basic element of our humanity, one that binds all kinds of nationalities and socioeconomic groups alike: mortality. It has been made easy to come to terms with the abhorrent human rights violations around the world through the thousands of images of suffering we are bombarded with daily while searching the web and watching the news. Add to the mix the violence and suffering in TV shows and movies for entertainment value, and you have the perfect recipe for desensitization. Linfield even notes “Not that photography stops atrocities, much less prevent them: our innocence on that front ended long ago. The belief in the saving power of exposure qua exposure can no longer be sustained”. Perhaps then, we do not need the viewer to feel morally and ethically obligated to prevent atrocities based on the empathy they feel for those depicted suffering, but if the photo can get the viewer thinking about their own fragility, that could be just enough. It is too subjective to use photos such as this one, to mobilize people because we are all empathetic and apathetic to different degrees. Linfield points this out when she says, “Photojournalists are responsible for the ethics of showing, but we are responsible for the ethics of seeing”. Everyone has a different moral and ethical code, unique to their own personal experiences. Linfield claims “The photograph of suffering presents us, too, with the specific individual experience of suffering. Victims of human-rights abuses are members of larger groups who are exploited, oppressed, even exterminated. But each experiences her pain and death, as do we all, through the prism of her unique self”. However, being confronted with mortality and vulnerability effects everyone, as it is as objective as it can be, because we all share it. Everyone dies alone. This image is a testament to a larger conversation regarding the ethics of photojournalism.

Is photojournalism an instrument of change or is our moral compass broken as a society? Can we hope for more than egocentrism? Regardless of the answer, this photo is necessary in starting an important conversation.