Stalemate
mdagdag@theguidon.com

Only recently did I find out what this “poverty porn” meant. As my friend aptly put it, poverty porn is “putting the poor in a vulnerable position to sell something.”

I will be honest; as a photographer, I do think that photos of the situation of the marginalized make for interesting images. They offer a certain drama that incites emotions of empathy among those who see the photos. Photographers nowadays flock to the gritty sites of Manila for the opportunity to shoot street life. With the rise of photo walks to these places came the sudden influx of photos showing the plight of the impoverished Filipino.

When dealing with such a sensitive issue such as poverty, certain lines have to be drawn. We have to ask ourselves, “What really is the purpose of photographing these types of situations?”

In March 1993, Kevin Carter took an iconic photograph in which a Sudanese child was on all fours, stalked by a vulture. The child was obviously weak and starved, and the vulture was waiting for her to die. The photo was so stunning that it earned Carter a Pulitzer Prize.

Those who saw the photo questioned the fate of the child, to which Carter had no answer. While it was obvious to him that the child was in grave danger, he did nothing more to help apart from chasing the vulture away. The St. Petersburg Times said that Carter, as the man who adjusted his camera in order to frame the child’s suffering correctly, could just as well be another vulture in the scene. This haunted Carter to the point that he committed suicide.

While photographers who take photos of the marginalized do not get to a point of photographing people battling for life, it is interesting to note their purpose of shooting such situations. Posting such photos on social media sites may garner numerous likes and shares; if fame and gratification is what the photographer was after, then this is clearly an exploitation of the poor.

These were my initial reactions to a photo contest hosted by the footwear company, Toms. In the contest, participants were encouraged to share their “Toms story” in relation to their advocacy, One for One, where for each pair of Toms a customer purchases, another will be given to charity. Do not get me wrong—I think it’s a good advocacy and I support Toms’ simple and concrete way of giving back to society.

However, what I did doubt were the entries that made it to the semi-finals of the photo competition. The entries gave the impression that the photographer used the poor in that photo as a ticket to the P15,000 grand prize. Most of the photos were staged photos and it is difficult to imagine how they were able to capture those. I can picture in my head how they walked up to a street kid and asked him to pose for a photo. In the photo, they made him sit on the street, barefoot, and then superimpose the logo of Toms just to fit the theme of the contest.

I am not one to judge the intentions of a photographer. However, these types of photos blatantly exploit the poor. For what purpose do the participants submit their photos if not in the hope of winning a decent amount of money?

Perhaps it is time to rethink the purpose of shooting photos. The sudden interest in street photography might just lead to the popularization of “poverty porn.”