Home » Quotables » When Truth Is Outlawed… UPDATED!

When Truth Is Outlawed… UPDATED!

By Jamie McIntyre Thursday, October 15th, 2009 5:22 pm
Posted in Quotables

UPDATE: Military Reverses Ban on Publicizing Fatal War Photos — Congressional Quarterly.
The U.S. military command in eastern Afghanistan has rescinded a ban on the publication of photos depicting slain U.S. military personnel, a Pentagon spokesman said Tuesday. The month-old ban had triggered concerns among lawmakers as well as from several media organizations.

When Truth Is Outlawed… Only Outlaws Will Have The Truth

The debate over whether the AP should have distributed a photograph of a mortally wounded marine was a healthy one. It was a debate over a judgment call, weighing the competing responsibilities of the press, informing the public, while displaying sensitively to families of fallen soldiers and respect for the dead. But the key point was that it was a decision that was left to news media to make, for better or worse.

SEE:
After Further Review: The AP Photo Controversy
Echoes of Vietnam

Now, according to Editor and Publisher, the military has gone a step farther — too far in my opinion — in an attempt to not just censor, but prevent news reporters from recording video or still images of any American combat deaths. (Presumably the ban does not apply to enemy dead.)

I certainly understand the intention of the policy, to protect the families of servicemembers from the pain and anguish of seeing photographs of their loved ones splashed across the media, but the heavy-handed ban smacks too much of an attempt to sanitize the war, just as the President must decides whether to send more troops into battle.

The military is saying, in effect, we trusted you with the decision, and you blew it, so now we’re taking the issue out of your hands.

But as tempting as this sounds, It’s the wrong move. Freedom of the press, as annoying and aggravating as it can be, is a freedom that should not be abridged just because it tells an uncomfortable, and unpleasant truth.

War is a dirty, dangerous, deadly business. But trying to hide under the guise of respect for the dead, is a dangerous precedent.

What do you think?

« « Bruce Fleming from 2005 | “Acid Test” for the Osprey in Afghanistan » »

Join the Conversation

	Karaka October 15th, 2009 at 11:43 pm You know, I think that’s a cogent point still, because in the Frontline documentary that aired Tuesday, there’s a soldier wounded before the camera; the documentary shows him being carried by his fellow men, as the v/o intones that he didn’t make it. Showing that was important. It underscored the reality of their situation. It was probably impossible for his family, friends, and brothers in arms to watch. But it was nevertheless important to see, for the US public to witness.
	David M October 16th, 2009 at 2:10 pm The Thunder Run has linked to this post in the blog post From the Front: 10/16/2009 News and Personal dispatches from the front and the home front.
	Carl Prine October 16th, 2009 at 3:17 pm It was nice meeting you at the COIN panel in DC last week, Jamie. You did a nice job as moderator. While I share with you the obvious concerns about press censorship, I think it’s vitally important that we in the press also maintain high standards for the work that we broadcast or publish. As you know, I had a great deal of difficulty defending the AP photo that started this controversy. It’s just my opinion, but I didn’t think that it conveyed a meaningful understanding of the conflict that, when balanced with a family’s grief, made it worthy of a large audience. While I believe that in the vast majority of cases the various media get it right, sometimes we don’t, and we must never abuse our First Amendment rights. It’s a tough balancing act, and like you I would err on the side of Constitutional guarantees. But that doesn’t mean that those of us who are professional journalists shouldn’t redouble our efforts to accurately and humanely depict what often is an inhumane, chaotic world. Our democracy deserves that.
	Jordan October 17th, 2009 at 12:54 am The photo of the dying Marine was a step too far on AP’s part. Yes, provide the public with an accurate, balanced perspective on war, but also consider basic human decency. I find this argument that we should show the gore so people understand the harsh reality of war to be self-serving and specious. We know war is bad. Pictures abound everywhere on the ugly reality of war. I think it’s pretty clear in everyone’s mind that soldiers die in war, sometimes horribly. Showing it isn’t necessarily something that serves “democracy” but rather, ratings and sales from morbid curiosity. I would believe these noble arguments about showing war’s harsh realities if journalists weren’t so careful to guard footage and photos of their own when injured in war. When Tom Woodruff and Kim Dozier were wounded, footage was available of the event. The company (ABC?) carefully guarded that footage, and we haven’t seen it to this day. Of course, if it had been a soldier, I’m sure it would have been played a hundred times. If we are to be exposed to war’s ugly truths, surely that includes photos of terrible journalist deaths and injuries in war, does it not? The media covering a war is just as much part of our free democracy as is the deployment of soldiers sent out to accomplish national goals on the peoples’ behalf. Why should there be two sets of rules for these groups? Both are integral to a democracy’s war effort. Let’s face it, this crass obsession on the part of journalists to see, document and publish images of soldiers dead or dying isn’t some noble effort to carry out democracy’s principles. It is an impulse far more craven and sometimes darkly ideological within the media community, that drives it. In Iraq and Afghanistan, the overwhelming amount of war correspondence has come with an ideological slant, so let’s not pretend when it comes to pictures of soldiers’ deaths, we’re all of a sudden so dedicated to unvarnished “truth”. In these two wars, the truth has been hard to come by, whether you’re talking about the government conducting it, or the media covering it. The past eight years have exposed a bankruptcy in competence, integrity and honesty in the American press that I never thought I’d see in this country. Don’t take this as media-bashing, but as constructive criticism and a reality check for a profession in dire need of reform. Democracy will survive us not seeing closeups of a Marine dying. It cannot survive with a dishonest and politically corrupt media. “Yeah, just blame the media.” i know. But that unserious response isn’t enough to fix the problem.
	John October 17th, 2009 at 4:56 am The reality is that war brings death and distruction. The majority of the people in the USA do not give a c-r-a-p and do not know that our men and women are facing death every minute in the war zone. Perhaps if there was widespread coverage of the war, to include the death and distruction, then there would not be an unnecessary war such as Iraq/A-Stan. I believe that, most of the media, are responsible and if not send them home. I am a three tour, 100% disabled Vietnam Veteran and I believe that all people should know what war brings and its not like in the movies. Semper Fidelis. Blackcoat.
	Roger Moore October 17th, 2009 at 11:39 am “But as tempting as this sounds, It’s the wrong move. Freedom of the press, as annoying and aggravating as it can be, is a freedom that should not be abridged just because it tells an uncomfortable, and unpleasant truth.” And which truth would that be Mr. Mc Intyre ? The one where we’re fed pablum according to the political slant of most so called journalists ? How about Accountability of the Press to go along with Freedom of the Press ? The press has abused the First Amendment at least to the extent that the government has and pardon me if I don’t shed any tears for most news agencies.
	mrbyron October 17th, 2009 at 5:16 pm I agree war is deadley business, but we also have a drug war in America, and the press allows coverage of all typs of violance hear at home; why can’t the press be allowed to cover are fallen hearo as well. We been in a eight year strugal of war and no one seem to have a clue how to bring our troops home, we need to show coverage because it is not the mistakes of our troops but our goverment.
	Carl Prine October 18th, 2009 at 3:28 pm “The past eight years have exposed a bankruptcy in competence, integrity and honesty in the American press that I never thought I’d see in this country. Don’t take this as media-bashing, but as constructive criticism and a reality check for a profession in dire need of reform. ” But there was nothing in your criticism that would suggest even a cursory understanding of the many American media, especially those who report overseas on war. You question the competence of seasoned war correspondents and their editors/producers, and yet you convey no competence whatsoever in discussing how they do their jobs, or why.
	Carl Prine October 18th, 2009 at 3:28 pm For example, this is inane: “Of course, if it had been a soldier, I’m sure it would have been played a hundred times.” But there have been NO images that I can recall showcasing the death of a service member that have been replayed iteratively. That’s what made the AP photo of the wounded Marine who later died so unusual that it led to an attempt at censoring the news. The reality is that the press had self-censored these images for eight years, and this was the first real breach of a rule imposed from within for all sorts of reasons (taste, compassion, etc). Unless you really believe that the AP photographer really was the first journalist to record on film the wounding of an American in uniform, of course. Talk about “unserious.”
	Carl Prine October 18th, 2009 at 3:29 pm The irony is that in a globalized, digital world, all sorts of nasty images are available to Americans. The various insurgent enemies of our nation routinely record and publish photos of IED blasts, sniper kills, etc. US combatants also post on YouTube and other internet fora images harvested from the wars we fight. My squadleader in OIF was shocked to find a video he recorded of a patrol that went all wrong — a dismounted Marine was blown to shreds by an IED on the shoulder of a roadway near Habbaniyah — placed onto YouTube by someone within the battalion who had watched it internally. I’ve been told that an IED blast that got me also is available online, should I wish to watch it, but I really have no desire to visit a Salafi website to watch buddies die. But it’s out there, and probably accessed more often than we want to admit by Americans.
	Carl Prine October 18th, 2009 at 3:29 pm What bothered me about the decision made in Bagram to censor images of embedded photojournalists was that it would have removed from the public record potentially important images. Capa’s iconic photograph of a falling soldier in the Spanish civil war would have been verboten. So would photos from Tarawa, the Battle of the Bulge and Normandy that were painful for families back home but vitally important to showing Americans why they fought WWII — so important that official censors requested that they be showcased. The work of Matthew Brady’s photographers are partially how we recollect the American Civil War, and yet what was considered important for a democracy to view in 1865 somehow is something to be outlawed today? Images of the dead and dying have appeared in published works for a wider audience since the Crimean War. Brady’s photos were featured in galleries, where crowds paid money to view them, not to mention their later iterations as engraved pictures in Harper’s Weekly and other mass-market magazines. And yet this sort of historical record, as disturbing as it is, would be lost due to official censorship in Afghanistan?
	Jeremy Potratz October 18th, 2009 at 10:41 pm During WWII the images of dead Marines, laying in the surf half covered with sand, at Tarawa were shown in Life Magazine (ask your grandparents if you’re too young to know what its importance was at the time). They were practically the first American dead seen by the public. I don’t know if it changed anything on the home front or not, but the fact that the taxpayers fund the war they should get to, and have to, see what they are paying for, be it good or bad. Censureship may make the military feel cloistered and more willing to sacrifice lives if it isn’t held accountable, I really don’t know, but America is SUPPOSED to be the land of the free and champion of freedom of the press. Just look how Iran just handled their anti-government demonstrations. When censureship prevailed the government began abusing their own citizens. How can any citizen trust the military establishment when they restrict The First Amendment of the Constitution???
	Wild Snide October 18th, 2009 at 11:59 pm Ok, Some of you people are missing the point completely here, the one’s that is saying it is right to show pictures of the dead. The Marine WASN’T dead.!!! The dieing deserve Dignity, at the very least. The last thing I would want, if I were in that situation, is a hare-brained AP reporter snapping photos of me as I drew my last breath, to be splashed across the tabloids for my family to see. Would you want your family to see you, Jeremy,Carl,Blackcoat, drawing your last breaths? Not other people deaths, yours? Also Carl, the press needs to police it’s own ranks, and until it does, a ban is necesary until it decides to ge it’s act together. There was no recriminations whatsoever from the AP for those who committed the dastardly act, and when it is done, to be broadcast far and wide to make a point.
	Carl Prine October 19th, 2009 at 12:28 am The decision to censor images was made, according to the Pentagon, by one officer in Afghanistan and without proper input from the Secretary of Defense and CENTCOM, which rescinded the new embedding rule. So, “Wild Snide,” apparently you disagree with the policy of much of the nation’s defense leadership. You wish to focus on an AP photo I’ve already suggested I couldn’t defend as a piece of art. The problem is that the ban also would have made verboten the works of the American Civil War’s Matthew Brady, Robert Capa’s iconic photo of a dying soldier in Spain’s revolution, not to mention the aforementioned images from Tarawa, Normandy and the Battle of the Bulge that were published during WWII at the insistence of war planners. Somehow I’m now supposed to believe that the images considered important for a democracy to see in every American conflict since 1861 (worldwide, the practice of publishing photos of the dead or dying goes back to the Crimean War) now are off limts because of one hazy photo from the Associated Press? Really?
	Carl Prine October 19th, 2009 at 12:36 am On another note, there really is no Constitutional violation by the armed forces here. The courts have told us that there’s no inherent right for reporters or photographers to tag along with US forces during wartime. The embedding process actually has a curious and complex history that can be explored elsewhere, but suffice it to say that it’s the military that has wanted journalists to embed. The ban on taking pictures of the dead or dying wouldn’t have applied to “unilateral” journos who didn’t formally embed with US units, nor would it have applied to photographers embedded with Afghan forces or with other allied units. Even embedded, there were no restrictions placed on photographing dead or wounded Afghan soldiers or civilians, enemies (unless they were detained), NATO allies or non-uniformed Americans who met with battlefield tragedy. Hypocritical? Probably. And ultimately unsuccessful because the military leadership determined that the press actually does a pretty good job of self-censoring distasteful or shocking images. That opens up its own debate.
	cprine@tribweb.com October 19th, 2009 at 12:42 am For some reason, not all my comments are saved. Oh well. I’ll try to type it out again. Wildsnide, despite the hazy AP photo (which I can’t defend artistically), the “Long War” might be the most sanitized American conflict since the invention of photography. The misplaced decision (since rescinded) to ban photos of the dead or dying would have removed from this democracy’s readership the images of Matthew Brady, who gave us the iconic images of the Civil War. Robert Capa’s landmark photograph of a falling soldier in Spain would have been outlawed. So too many of the shots the War Department in WWII thought the American public needed to see, including fairly ghastly images from Normandy, Tarawa and the Battle of the Bulge. I have to wonder why you would be so quick to ban the sorts of photographs Lincoln, FDR and Ronald Reagan thought OK for a free people to see? It’s a balancing act, of course, but I think much of the time the press gets it right.
	Sid October 19th, 2009 at 1:32 pm Fine ..Post pictures of dead,dying muitilated journalists
	Kyle York October 19th, 2009 at 4:18 pm Any citizen sending soldiers into battle… blithely so, with every bite of their morning toast… every patriot and taxpayer should understand the unfathomably horrid face of war. Visions of noble knights and squeaky-clean Predators quickly vanish with a look into the faces of the dead and the dying. Americans first learned those horrible realities not last week or 1944, not from AP or Frontline, but almost 150 years ago when Matthew Brady set up the first public display of uncensored photographs fresh from the raw battlefields of Antietam. The public was shocked, outraged, horrified… and educated. If our government succeeds in sanitizing war, God help our men and women in Harm’s Way as we read the morning paper and look way, look away, look away. Savor that glorious valor, to live and die in Dixie.
	Sorry its my cash October 19th, 2009 at 6:37 pm What is the problem here? Faces can be censored, name tags can be censored. No mother then has to see pictures of her dying son, the public gets to see a tiny tiny bit of the reality of war. Some people can learn from other people some can’t they just have to expirience things first hand perhaps because they have no imagination. I heard an old German man speaking recently. He said, it was late in the war I had already killed so many Russians then in Breslau as I was running down a street suddenly a Russian appeared before me only 5 meters away, I raised my rifle, he was so young, his face was so beautiful, I did not pull the trigger, he saw me and raised his rifle, he did not fire either, he was probably confused about why I had not already killed him, there we stood with our rifles pointed at each others heads from a distance of 5 meters, this situation must have lasted for 3 or 4 seconds, .….…..he was the better man.….……I was the one who had children. Dont think for a second that just because you kill someone in Iraq or Afghanistan that you are the better man, or a force for justice. The person that you killed might have had backward views on educating women, or the death penalty, but you are a foreigner in their country at best taking sides in a civil war in which none of the sides are fountains of enlightenment. Furthermore who’s to say that you do not have some pretty backward ideas of your own when all is said and done. Curt Kastens
	LazarusUnbound October 20th, 2009 at 6:37 am This whole argument is absolutely ridiculous. Debating whether a photo of a dying marine should be ALLOWED to be seen? Spare me the morality arguments– those are between you and your gods. If you disapprove then don’t look at it, but don’t stand in judgement deciding whether or not I or anyone else should see it. Citizens SHOULD see the end results of their political actions and inactions without a candy coating. News agencies are NOT propaganda mills for the military or the government– at least they aren’t supposed to be. Their record in this war has been pathetic overall. So they finally showed an American servicemember mortally wounded– its only been 8 freakin years of warfare! If you were against it being shown– then when you return from over there– never ever utter that complaint– ‘they just don’t know what its like over there’ when someone says something less than intelligent about it. It will be YOUR fault citizens are ignorant of the situation and how bad it can be.
	Sorry my ass October 20th, 2009 at 9:06 am Say I really really would take pleasure in seeing pictures of dead and dying generals, politicians, lawyers, bankers, journalists, and military chaplins. That last one might seem really cruel but I think it is well deserved. They should have to start over just like the others on the list that they support. I only know of one exception and he was a reservist in Georgia I think. Holy people my ass. I know petty thieves more holy than military chaplins. One goes by the name of Illias, from Tunisia, and he has 108 knife scares on his body. I counted them. But then that would go over the head of the military chaplins wouldn’t it? I wonder if it would go over the head of MI. Curt Kastens PS. It was either that or do pushups and I sure as heck am not going to be doing any unneccessary pushups.
	blank stairs October 20th, 2009 at 9:32 pm Ok it took quite a while from the time that I wrote my comments until they appeared. I wonder if the decision to let them be shown was harder than even whether or not to show a film of a wounded or dying soldier? Freedom of speech is suppossed to be so sacred. Right a lot of good it does to have the freedom to walk around our house and shout at the top of our lungs. Oh right I can start my own blog! I can fly to Duluth and and walk through a forest along the shores of Lake Supirior and shout at the top of my lungs and the only beings that will hear me will be the spirits of my dead my dead ancestors. Freedom of speech is a concept that does a lot more to help those with millions of dollars to spread their agenda than those in lower socio economic positions. Great I am happy I got something printed on mil.com. But will it make any sense to anyone that sees it? If it did make sense to someone would it be someone that is in a position to use it productively? After all real officers and NCOs are to busy to read these threads. If they do have any free time they would use it watching the Pentagon channel where they get the real information. God forbid should US soldiers actually get a chance to listen to their enemies. They might find out that their enemies are actually right about something(s). Does anyone want to accuse me of not listening to my enemies? Maybe I am also guilty of this sin. Yes in one sense I am guilty of this sin. My patience is not unlimited either. There are some things that I find so outrageous I pay little attention to the proponents of such things. But I think that I have had a broad exposure to many different cultures, religions, and philosophies so I may not be an expert but I am at least a layman on what constitutes outrageous. It is to bad that there are 100 million other people out there, in the US, that say the same thing. Fortunately they are not talking to you right now. For better or worse, I am. Curt Kastens
	MR6 October 25th, 2009 at 3:04 am You wanna watch it, ruck up, get a rifle and a front row seat. Otherwise…go watch a train wreck.

NOTE: Comments are limited to 2500 characters and spaces.

By commenting on this topic you agree to the terms and conditions of our User Agreement

Carl Prine's Line of Departure

When Truth Is Outlawed… UPDATED!

Join the Conversation

Recent Comments