Bruce Schneier has a great blog article on “The War on Photography” that is causing problems for photographers in formerly free countries around the world. If you are into photography (and/or freedom) it’s well worth a read. One part I will reproduce here is a paragraph with some useful links for us photographers (I’ve added the link for “photographers rights” which wasn’t in the original).
This is worth fighting. Search “photographer rights” on Google and download one of the several wallet documents that can help you if you get harassed; I found one for the UK, US, and Australia. Don’t cede your right to photograph in public. Don’t propagate the terrorist photographer story. Remind them that prohibiting photography was something we used to ridicule about the USSR. Eventually sanity will be restored, but it may take a while.
The Aussie version is already printed and in my camera bag, and remember that:
The 9/11 terrorists didn’t photograph anything. Nor did the London transport bombers, the Madrid subway bombers, or the liquid bombers arrested in 2006. Timothy McVeigh didn’t photograph the Oklahoma City Federal Building. The Unabomber didn’t photograph anything; neither did shoe-bomber Richard Reid.
It’s just security theatre..
Links to useful documents:
- http://www.sirimo.co.uk/ukpr.php
- http://www.krages.com/phoright.htm
- http://www.artslaw.com.au/_documents/files/StreetPhotographersRights.pdf
The stereotypes of street photographers:
Asian guy with camera == tourist
Middle Eastern guy with camera == terrorist
Caucasian guy with camera == paedophile
Thanks for the link Chris, great post … didn’t realize this fiasco was brewing … dear me, I wonder what these guys were thinking me while I was innocently photographing. But I was in San Francisco which perhaps explains why they were happy for me to photograph all I wanted. Back in Canberra now, and still haven’t taken any photos of the parliament house, perhaps now is not a good time 🙂
This has nothing to do with terrorism, it is a lame excuess to protect police and keep them from being caught on video doing things that they should not be doing.
It is a scare tactic that is as old as the ages. You attack a few, arrest them, put it in the paper and it quelches dissent and rebellion for a period.
This is in the rulebook for tyrants. It was practiced in Germany in the early 30’s before Hitler went totaly crazy.
It is slowly teaching cowards that you have NO rights. That you will be arrested regardless of the laws to protect you. And that the cost is not worth carrying a camera or video camera in public.
I am not a photographer, but I know enough about history to see the coming fascist country that the US is slowly turning into under the guise of “Terrorism”!