There are dead children all over the world, and plenty of pictures of them. A photograph is notable not because it shows dead children, but because it shows an emotionally poignant scene that reverberates with its audience.
If the photo's made up, it's no better than a poster. It can be drawn with skill and make the same point, but it is not a photograph and so does not deserve a photography award.
The dead children just make it worse ethically. There are thousands ways to make a political point, the ones using dead bodies or suffering kids should be out of question. It is despicable.
This argument makes absolutely no sense. The 'political point' here is that children are being killed. If you can't use the dead bodies of children to illustrate this, then what can you use? Digitial manipulation is irrelevant to the fact that this was a real funeral with real dead children.
Whenever I see photos of suffering children in a political context for me it is the "look at those poor children, clearly the [opposing group] are poor evil" argument. Which is not about the children anymore, it's about diverting your attention from the cause of the problem. And this argument is used over and over on any occasion. How can you not become numb to that?
My argument is that there are some limits to what can be exposed to the public. You won't show on tv pictures of abused children to fight against children abuse. As a father, each time I see dead children I can't stop imagining it could be my kids, it hurts deeply, striking very intimate chords. I don't think it is ethical to strike these chords. These kind of pictures can be used as proofs if needed, but should not be public.
What's more despicable about killing children than about killing people of other ages?
Yet it's the children that are frequently used for political arguments. And that is disgusting.
What's more despicable about killing children than about killing people of other ages?
Perhaps the fact that they can't defend themselves? Or that you can't say that you just made the world better eliminating some dangerous terrorists? Or the fact that they had their whole life to live? You only have to choose.
Medical (and other) interventions that are effective on children are judged as more valuable than those that are effective on the extremely elderly due to the concept of "quality adjusted life years" (QALYs)[1]. Of course, people's emotional reaction to children being killed is merely based on evolutionary adaptedness, and has nothing to do with whether its morally justified for them to feel a particular level of outrage.
Frankly, looking at the other fotos I find it quite hard to believe those children are even dead.
Firstly, muslims would never show images of dead people, but brushing that aside (and that would require explaining why hamas would have no problem with showing a few palestinian atheists world-wide. Also would those people behaving against islam's principles be in a large angry mob on the streets of Gaza ? I mean, that is avoided by most pious muslims in Gaza I hear).
Where are the wounds ? A bombardment kills by using shrapnel - lots of it - as bullets, or by crushing. Obviously these children haven't been crushed. The right child's face is full of sand, but the white burial clots is immaculate. They are lying flat ... euhm ... how did that happen ? (In case you don't know there's a reason they call a corpse "a stiff"). If they died through bombardment they wouldn't have been lying, they would have been curled up. Since nobody collects dead bodies immediately after a bombardment (would have to be in 2 hours or less), they would experience rigor mortis in the curled up position. At that point the only way to get them into a lying position would be to break all of their bones, which takes time and a lot of effort. The bodies in the picture are obviously not experiencing rigor mortis, they are flexible and move with the arms of those men ... so what is it ?
Either these kids died in the last 60 minutes before the picture was taken (where's the blood ? I hear even muslims have blood. And ahem, all muscles relax, which would color such an immaculate burial cloth yellow and brown for reasons I won't go into, again where are those discolorations ?). Furthermore the eyes wouldn't stay closed. Or they're past rigor mortis, dead for at least 3 days ... so why is there skin wet ? Why is there no loss of skin tone ? And frankly a corpse 3 days old smells to the point that no emotion will allow you to ignore that, and the smell is easily detected from 10 meters away in open air (no matter how exiting a medical student tells you it is, never open a drawer with a corpse, just don't, you'll still smell it constantly a week later).
The easy explanation for all of this is very, very simple : those kids are alive (they even look like they're holding their eyes closed, although that could be an impression). Lying about it would be perfectly in line with islamic practice (probably important for large angry mobs in gaze, don't you think ?), it would explain the lack of wounds, lack of blood/other bodily fluids, the eyes, the skin tone, the flexibility of the children, everything.
That would of course mean that it is a complete lie, and the photographer is very likely complicit.
>Firstly, muslims would never show images of dead people
What BS is this? I follow world news for 20+ years. There have been countless, literally tens of thousands, pictures of dead people in muslim countries.
>Frankly, looking at the other fotos I find it quite hard to believe those children are even dead. (...) where's the blood? I hear even muslims have blood.
Really? Really?
And it goes downhill from there, with your explanations of why they are not really dead, of the "I've seen a lot of CSI on TV" quality.
Spoken like a true ignorant that has never gone 5 minutes away from his hometown in rural Idaho (or TV-land, which is the same).
All the BS about rigor mortis etc, are not even TV-doctor quality, but what is especially disturbing is the lack of humanity and empathy.
I've heard similar points made before and while I can concede that they are at least somewhat coherent - or "not impossible" - they are almost always riddled with bad grammar and every other sentence is an affront to any sense of compassion.
I'm fine with people using Occams Razor even if the conclusion that brings about is uncomfortable for me. But I'm not OK if the argument made lacks basic human dignity.
> (where's the blood ? I hear even muslims have blood. And ahem, all muscles relax, which would color such an immaculate burial cloth yellow and brown for reasons I won't go into, again where are those discolorations ?)
Yes, they dirtied and wrapped a living child in a cloth to stage a dead child and forgot to simulate piss and shit stains necessary to pass your analysis. Huge slipup on their part. Not possible that a parent or relative would first take care to ensure the dignity of their child to remain intact before bringing them out to show their grief in front of their community.
> And frankly a corpse 3 days old smells to the point that no emotion will allow you to ignore that
You might be surprised.
There are stories around of mothers tending to their stillborn fetus for weeks. I think one even made a blog about it.
I suppose we can conclude that you are falling victim to the limits of your own experience and imagination. Otherwise known as ignorance.
