These abuses led to the death of at least one prisoner and include rape with a broomstick and other violence. Approximately a month
before that story broke into the news - but after various international agencies had reported its existence - photos were circulating showing an alleged
rape of an Iraqi woman by US soldiers. These “fakes” come from a porno web site. The Daily Mirror published another set of photographs allegedly
showing British soldiers abusing prisoners. The editor of the newspaper, Piers Morgan, was forced to resign for having published the fakes (under pressure
from business interests in the newspaper who were interested in squashing any investigative journalism in this direction - sensationalist or otherwise)
and on the superficial grounds that, according to the army, it endangered British soldiers and was “a recruiting poster for al-Qaeda.” The
irony of the matter is that Islamic jihadists are now circulating the porno photos as real, possibly with much greater effect than the real photos could
ever have achieved. |
 |
Thus we are required to develop criteria, sensibilities and scepticism that go beyond the traditional categories (but still include
them). As waves of images wash over us and we can no longer rely on the customary collusion that they refer to reality. In most cases this won’t
matter. Where it does, we have to ask where the image comes from, who made it, why and so on. This is a question of the power behind the image, a question
which asks us to adjudicate on the intention of the image maker and the degree of trust we can place in them as well as the socio-political context in
which the image was made and is presently placed. One thing is certain, maintaining distinctions between art images and mass media images is becoming
less easy. Vattimo put it succinctly when he suggested that we will have to get used to living with a “world
of images of the world.” |
