Blurring the lines – Part 2 – Fragments of Memory

A few weeks ago, at the Old Biscuit Mill Beer Festival, someone snapped a picture of my thirteen month old daughter on their cellphone, someone who’s only contact with me had been to comment on the cuteness of my child before taking out their Blackberry and turning her into a screensaver. The very next day, at the You & Me & Everyone We Know Market, a second stranger slid a camera out of its pouch and took a picture of Amber-Jane dancing in the sun.
 
On neither of these occasions was I asked for my permission. Nor was the screen wasn’t offered to me for perusal like one would to a friend. The shots were simply taken and what has happened to them, I will never know.

Both times these unsolicited snaps left me feeling slightly violated and, for several weeks since, I’ve pondered the incidents from every angle. At first, I came to the conclusion that in this digital age, with it’s chain emails of kittens being cute, kidnapped kids, drunk tarts passed out on pavements etcetera etcetera ad nauseam, we’ve lost the boundaries between public domain and that which belongs to the private citizen. Perhaps Orwell was not so far off in predicting a world in which we are all watched. The internet, with it’s instant file sharing and download capacity, has become Big Brother, but unlike the Orwellian world of 1984, we are our own worst enemy, invading our own privacy and eroding our own sense of individual identity.

A few hours later, when the shock and outrage wore off, I realised I was a hypocrite. Hadn’t I done exactly the same thing on my travels? While in Laos, I’d snapped a shot of a small girl on the back of a water buffalo. I’ve taken pictures of babies being dunked in the Ganga in Varanasi, of naked Pech Indian kids surfing in Honduras, of a muddy toddler in Zanzibar. On none of these occasions did I seek permission from them or their parents. They were simply scenery, and I a traveler documenting a foreign landscape. The images of those children, like the ones of Amber-Jane, are just the fragments of a stranger’s memory.

So, do I think it’s okay for strangers to take photographs of my child? The jury is still out on that one, but what I do know is that next time I want to snap a shot of another human being,  I’ll ask.