{"id":63719,"date":"2014-08-14T09:00:31","date_gmt":"2014-08-14T14:00:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/?p=63719"},"modified":"2014-09-17T01:35:17","modified_gmt":"2014-09-17T06:35:17","slug":"iftheygunnedmedown-a-scathing-attack-on-media-portrayals-of-black-people-killed-by-police","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/2014\/08\/14\/iftheygunnedmedown-a-scathing-attack-on-media-portrayals-of-black-people-killed-by-police\/","title":{"rendered":"#IfTheyGunnedMeDown Attacks Portrayals of Black Men Killed by Police"},"content":{"rendered":"

This has been a hard week. \u00a0Another young, unarmed black man was killed by police. The Root added Michael Brown’s\u00a0face to a slideshow of such incidents<\/a>, started after\u00a0a black man named Eric Garner died after being put in a chokehold by officers less than one month ago. \u00a0This week’s guilty verdict in the trial of the man who shot Renisha McBride left me feeling numb. \u00a0Nothing good could come of it, but at least I didn’t feel worse.<\/p>\n

The shooting of Michael Brown, however, is still undergoing trial by media and the verdict is swayed by the choices made by producers and directors as to how to portray him. When Marc Duggan was killed by police earlier this year, they often featured pictures in which he looked menacing, including ones that had been\u00a0cropped<\/a>\u00a0in ways that enhanced that impression.<\/p>\n

Left: Photo of Duggan frequently used by media; right: uncropped photo in which he holds a plaque commemorating his deceased daughter.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"antonio_gramsci_by_ludilozezanje-d5eqwsv\"<\/a><\/p>\n

As the media coverage of Brown’s death heated up, the image that first circulated of Brown was this:<\/p>\n

\"4\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Reports state that this\u00a0was his current Facebook profile picture, with the implication that media actors just picked the first or most prominent picture they saw. \u00a0Or, even, that somehow it’s Brown’s fault that this is the image they used.<\/p>\n

Using the image above, though, is not neutrality. \u00a0At best, it’s laziness; they\u00a0simply decided not to\u00a0make a conscious, careful choice. \u00a0It’s their job<\/em> to pick a photograph and I don’t know exactly what the guidelines are but “pick the first one you see” or “whatever his Facebook profile pic was\u00a0on the day he died”\u00a0is probably not among them.<\/p>\n

There are consequential choices to be made. \u00a0As an example, here are two photos\u00a0that have circulated since criticism of his portrayal began — the top more obviously sympathetic and the bottom more neutral:<\/p>\n

\"2\"<\/a> \"3\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Commenting on this phenomenon, Twitter user\u00a0@CJ_musick_lawya<\/a>\u00a0released two photos of himself, hashtagged with #iftheygunnedmedown<\/a>, and asked readers which photo they thought media actors would choose.<\/p>\n

Top: Wearing a cap and gown with former President Clinton; bottom: in sunglasses\u00a0posing with a bottle\u00a0and a microphone.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"1\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The juxtaposition brilliantly revealed how easy it is to demonize a person, especially if they are a member of a social group\u00a0stereotyped\u00a0as violence-prone, and how important representation is. \u00a0It caught on and the imagery was repeated to powerful effect. A summary at The Root<\/a> featured examples like these:<\/p>\n

\"2\"<\/a> \"3\"<\/a> \"4\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The New York Times<\/em> reports<\/a> that the hashtag has been used more than 168,000 times as of \u00a0August 12th. \u00a0I want to believe that conversations like these will educate and put pressure on those with the power to represent black men and all marginalized peoples to make more responsible and thoughtful decisions.<\/p>\nLisa Wade, PhD<\/a> is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of <\/em>American Hookup<\/a>, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender<\/a>; and a forthcoming introductory text: <\/em>Terrible Magnificent Sociology<\/a>.\u00a0You can follow her on Twitter<\/a> and Instagram<\/a>.<\/em><\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This has been a hard week. \u00a0Another young, unarmed black man was killed by police. The Root added Michael Brown’s\u00a0face to a slideshow of such incidents, started after\u00a0a black man named Eric Garner died after being put in a chokehold by officers less than one month ago. \u00a0This week’s guilty verdict in the trial of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":63720,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[12508,2056,23384,129,23624,20059,283,285,1760,20063,140,293,23622,133],"class_list":["post-63719","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-activismsocial-movements","tag-crimelaw","tag-social-construction-discourselanguage","tag-media","tag-media-newsopinion","tag-media-social-media","tag-prejudicediscrimination","tag-raceethnicity","tag-raceethnicity-blacksafricans","tag-raceethnicity-prejudicediscrimination","tag-internet","tag-social-construction","tag-social-construction-symbols","tag-violence"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/files\/2014\/08\/111.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63719","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63719"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63719\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":63736,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63719\/revisions\/63736"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63720"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63719"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63719"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63719"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}