Wednesday 20 May 2009

Response Essay 2 May 20,2009

Everyday we open a new fashion magazine to see our favourite star on the cover fitting that same old “skinny” stereotype, we are left to believe that this is really what they look like and in turn many believe that we should look like that as well, but what if the public knew about retouching, would some of the pressure be off? What is really wrong with retouching and changing the content of a photograph that’s published in a magazine or newspaper, for little things in my opinion isn’t a big deal, I think that getting rid of a random pair of legs or putting a basketball where there wasn’t one is not a problem, where I disagree with retouching is when it breaches ethics and becomes a totally different picture. One example of why I think retouching can be a bad thing is the 1989 TV Guide cover with Oprah’s head on Anne Margaret’s body, this cover is also mentioned in the article and always the speculation of media ethics “In my media ethics courses, I always bring up the deception used by TV Guide when they put Oprah Winfrey's head on Ann Margaret's body,” -Lee Anne Peck, an assistant professor of journalism and mass communications at the University of Northern Colorado” I think that it is morally wrong to significantly alter any photo and I believe that magazine’s and newspaper’s could take a little more responsibility when it comes to controlling the images that they put out for the public to see.
Readers can have a short term memory when it comes to things they see, as a future journalist I would like to think that the stories I will work so hard wont be in the trash the next day, but that can be the truth.Franca Agnoli, from the University of Padova is quoted in the article saying “One major result was that viewing modified images affected not only the way people remember past public events, but also their attitudes and behavioral intentions.” I strongly agree with this statement in the second article there are two pictures of a protest in Beijing one with no crowd, doctored by the Chinese government and one with lots of people on either side, for people who are just reading their paper at home and who were not at the rally they would only know the picture the government put out. I don’t think that magazines and newspapers should use edited images however small changes like a basketball where there wasn’t one during a basketball game is minor and in my opinion acceptable.
I consider anything that is completely not true deceptive, such as Britney Spears “on the cover” of Blender, when she didn’t even pose, In my opinion that type of editing turns respectable magazines into nothing more than the National Enquirer. “Any media that employ digitally doctored photographs will have a stronger effect than merely influencing our opinion” When a magazine chooses to edit to the point that it is falsifying what actually happened, I think that is unacceptable and deceptive. I think legitimate editing of a picture is slightly changing the color to make it look better. I think that there is no way that photo editing could truly be stopped, because in today’s world with all the technology, why not make a picture look a little better, however when it breaches ethics and makes someone look bad, that is where I draw a personal line. In the future I feel like magazines should more carefully watch for editing and retouching and maybe we will start seeing unedited pictures that are even more beautiful than edited ones.

1 comment:

  1. It does make it like The National Enquirer.

    Watch some of your run-on sentences.

    ReplyDelete