Sarah Lewis thinks photography's history is racist (NYT)

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

Yes.

So you equate africans to gorillas?

[amolitor]

So you equate africans to gorillas?

Perhaps he means that it's natural for people of one ethnicity to kind of forget about the existence, or importance, of other ethnic groups.

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

So you equate africans to gorillas?

You are smarter than that, creating a strawman.

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

Perhaps he means that it's natural for people of one ethnicity to kind of forget about the existence, or importance, of other ethnic groups.

And that was not even a strawman, just plain stupid.

[amolitor]

Honestly, Bart, I would not assume that Slobodan has a point here. He often does not, he's just being a vaguely anti-PC contrarian. That's his schtick.

[HonorableSensor]

I am surprised that this thread added so many posts so quickly!

One thing occurred to me, which is, that the digital sensor, and the film, both respond in ways that are very very different from the way our eyes actually process a scene in front of us. 

Given this, it seems even more silly for the author of the original piece to complain about the reaction of chemicals or silicon in comparison to the human eye...

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

You are smarter than that, creating a strawman.

Then care to explain what you did mean when you responded:

Don't blame the technology, geeks, or AI, but mother nature.

[Rob C]

1.  So you equate africans to gorillas?... Bart

2.  Don't blame the technology, geeks, or AI, but mother nature... Slobodan

Bart, that's silly. The point being made is one of tonality. Even I could understand that, me wot ain't even no professor!

I'm a skinny, damaged old white guy; I'd rather fight an African gentleman than a gorilla any day, even though given the chance, I'd fight nobody or anything. Even old age is beating the hell out of me.

;-)

[amolitor]

While it is tempting to say that google's AI was simply foxed by the skin color, that explanation is incorrect.

[Rob C]

HonorableSensor had a point in his opening post, for even here, honorable members are also incapable - at times - of accepting that sometimes a zebra is just a zebra and neither an electronic camera aid nor a horse in drag.

I thought gorillas were mostly rolls of gaffer tape? That said, I do remember - just - that during my teens we would occasionally refer to ciggies as gorillas too, but I have no idea of the provenance of that one; I just joined the mob, which I was later to learn was the worst path to follow even if the most travelled. That was perhaps the second most significant lesson of my life.

Rob

[amolitor]

We are talking at cross purposes, Rob.

I, at any rate, accept that a zebra is a zebra. The point is, with this many zebras around, every one of them an honest zebra, it becomes reasonable to suspect that we might be in Africa.

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

..He often does not, he's just being a vaguely anti-PC contrarian...

Vaguely? Vaguely!? That’s an insult, my friend*

*Vaguely

[Rob C]

We are talking at cross purposes, Rob.

I, at any rate, accept that a zebra is a zebra. The point is, with this many zebras around, every one of them an honest zebra, it becomes reasonable to suspect that we might be in Africa.

Just as well we are not referring to professors, then, but honest, bona fide animals with either black and white stripes or, as some cynics would have it, white and black stripes. With all that confusion in nature already, the uncertainties, you'd think folks would have some sympathy with the poor old camera manufacturers and cut them some slack here and there.

Regarding the point made elsewhere about wedding pictures and grooms (nothing to do with horse or zebra) in black, and brides in white - yet another gesture devoid of current-day rationality but full of wishful thinking and post-modern hopes - we can only safely assume that those who still continue to clamour for same are of split personality bordering on the rabid: don't they grasp that all those pictures that will cost them so much and that they will never look at again other than as evidence one way or the other, won't even be properly exposed to make the cake look right? As bad, that the files will have to be tampered with just to accommodate the silly clothes, will possibly lead to their dismissal in court.

Thinking of the cake reminds me that it's the real victim of the event, about to be ravished, torn asunder and tossed to the masses out there. I was about to mention the horseshoe, but realised it would just bring us full circle to the bloody zebras once again.

[Robert Roaldi]

For anyone interested, removing bias in AI is a growing field of study. If you google the term, you'll get tons of review and more detailed articles. Just one example https://www.technologyreview.com/s/612876/this-is-how-ai-bias-really-happensand-why-its-so-hard-to-fix/. There may even be TED talks on the subject. I tried to locate the podcast that I mentioned earlier on this thread but I failed to find it, sorry.

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

... I was about to mention the horseshoe, but realised it would just bring us full circle to the bloody zebras once again.

Speaking of horses, some white faces resemble horses (e.g. French actor Fernandel), some pigs (my high school psychology teacher).

[Slobodan Blagojevic]

Since this is a photographic forum, I'll contribute a self-portrait.

So much humanity in that what-are-you-looking-at stare:


Ape by Slobodan Blagojevic, on Flickr

[Two23]

So what news paper do you 'trust' / find credible

Pretty much none of them.  WSJ seems most fact based but isn't a general interest publication.


Kent in SD

[amolitor]

We take the saturday WSJ, which is in general excellent. Avoid the op-ed pages, which can approach comical, and are only occasionally sensible.

It comes monthly with a surprisingly good arts/fashion/culture magazine which keeps me peripherally apprised both of what the major labels are doing photographically in their advertising (they *all* take ads, which means that there's almost always 1 or 2 things that are truly wonderful), as well as lightly acquainted with the world of high end art and design.

The Christian Science Monitor was once very well respected, but I have not looked in on them in a while.

The NYT is a demented joke at this point,  but pieces of the sort cited stand apart in the NYT or any medium. They are statements of opinion, and of personal experience. There is no "journalistic" aspect to be judged here. Just as the WSJ opinion pieces stand apart from their paper, so does this one. In general the NYT's photography coverage seems to exist in its own little world. Not a world I always love, but anyways separate.