Eliminating Gun Terminlogy From Photography

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My goodness, but a lot of you don't have much of anything to do during this week b/w Christmas and New Year's do you?

FWIW, I shoot my camera like Eros shoots arrows (so much for the gun analogy).

If the resulting pics are any good, I show them off and "shoot the breeze" with Zeus and Hera who always admire them. I'm their favorite - you know.

If they are crummy then I say "Oh, shoot..." because I'm not supposed to swear on RFF!

"I shot a photo in the air....i"
 
Athena said:
My goodness, but a lot of you don't have much of anything to do during this week b/w Christmas and New Year's do you?

FWIW, I shoot my camera like Eros shoots arrows (so much for the gun analogy).

If the resulting pics are any good, I show them off and "shoot the breeze" with Zeus and Hera who always admire them. I'm their favorite - you know.

If they are crummy then I say "Oh, shoot..." because I'm not supposed to swear on RFF!

"I shot a photo in the air....i"
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the goddess has said it and I believe it! :D

Todd
 
I find my FSU et al cameras to be natural extensions of my FSU et al firearms and those duel use terms completely appropriate. Life is too short to bother with nuance political correctness and the insincerity that so often accompanies it, IMO.

Cheers
 
When I ask a stranger for permission to photograph them, I don't ask if I can "shoot them". Aside from that any effort to change the language I use in talking photography is likely to cause an increase in the "undesireable terms" that coincidently are a part of the language of firearms. I live in what many believe is the center of "liberal" thinking- Cambridge, MA. The PC police are rampant here and frankly, if some of these folks spent a little more time thinking about the smartest way to cross the street rather than what words and phrases may possibly be offensive this would be a better place to live.
My response to the "teacher" would have gone something like this:
"yeah,whatever. What can you teach about shooting pictures?"

By the way- I find the term "got off Scot free" to be offensive, so let's don't use it hmmmm? and no thinking it either.

steve
 
I may be an outlier, but I don't see why this would be about political correctness (an oxymoron, by the way). Left and right wing, maybe. Wasn't Dick Cheney hunting recently? :angel:

I grew up watching elmer shooting at bugs. The cartoons nowadays are even more violent. You can block it, if you want. The beauty is, it's your choice.

And yes, my son got a Daisy Red Ryder for Christmas. ;)
 
Shoot -- The word originally didn't have anything to do with guns; it preceded guns. The verb is just what a bullet does; also an arrow, a fast car coming out of a tunnel, a sled on a hill, a meteor, etc.

http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=shoot

The problem with a teacher making this argument is that if there's a grade involved, there is an implied threat. Keep saying 'shoot' and an A becomes a B; not a good thing for, say, an art student.

Imagine how upset people of a different political stripe might be if a computer science instructor said, "I don't ever want to hear the phrase "abort a program" because it reminds me of how many little children have been murdered in abortion clinics." It's not so much that you would care about his opinion, as about the implied extortion.

There's personality involved, of course; if the teacher's really pretty mellow about it, and is just venturing a thought, maybe there's no harm done.

Politically correct. The first time I ever saw this term in its current usage, was in Time magazine, in regard to movies, like "China Syndrome," being made by Jane Fonda. It was used without irony or self-consciousness, and was not particularly derogatory. I don't remember the exact phrase, but it was something to the effect that people in the counter-culture "agree that her films are politically correct, and...etc."

JC
 
I don't think that this is a P.C. issue at all. It has to do with the larger concept of the English language. Firearms related terms are common in English vocabulary, but I still believe that context rules. Shooting means many different things depending upon context, be it surveying, photography, firearms or navigation.

By the way, I find the term "got off Scot free" to be offensive, so let's don't use it hmmmm? and no thinking it either. [QOUTE].

Similar to the common use of the term "paddy wagon" in the U.S. Often considered offensive to folks of Irish descent here in the USA. The innocent use of this term by uninformed folks is overlooked or forgiven. I am not of Irish descent, but have many friends that are.
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BTW, the term "politically correct" has a rather sordid history. The term was in common usage in the USSR during the Stalin years. Politically-incorrect speech was one of the many reasons that could get one sent to a Siberian labor camp in the 1930's.
 
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climbing_vine said:
Just in the interest of combating silly talking points, there was in fact a "vast right-wing conpiracy" in the particular milieu of which Hilary was speaking. And it's proudly admitted by its organizer, Richard Mellon Scaife. It was pretty much just a tabloid-style campaign; he paid anyone who came forward with "dirt" about the Clintons, and published it with little-to-no fact checking, with the express aim of having these stories picked up by the conservative press (such as the American Spectator) and in turn the "mainstream media". It worked. This is no secret; the only stretch is in calling it a "conspiracy", but it certainly did exist as a planned effort to push stories with little factual backing into the evening news and major papers. The people who funded and participated freely acknowledge it. Scaife also worked with groups in Arkansas who paid witnesses for their testimony in court and at congressional hearings; this, likewise has been admitted to and resulted in successful lawsuits and criminal convictions.

For the record, Larry Flynt spearheaded a similar effort aimed in the opposite direction in response.

This has been a standard practice in American politics and journalism for a long time. It's worth reading about the history of the tactic. While I hate, hate, hate Hillary's politics, you should be deeply distrustful of any pundit or journalist or politician who tries to tell you that there was no "vast right-wing conspiracy". They are lying to you, flat-out.
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The phrase "Vast Right Wing Conspiracy" was first uttered by Mrs. Clinton on a morning news show (Today show probably) in response to a question about the veracity of the statement that Mr. Clinton had an affair with Ms. Lewinsky and lied about it under oath. She said it was not true, which it was. The questioner even asked, "If it was true..", and Hillary responded that if it were true it would be a very serious problem.

I remember standing there getting ready for work dumbstruck at the possibility that either Hillary didn't know or was acting at an Oscar level.

So when I poke fun at people about the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy, its not so much that there weren't political operatives behind the scenes, its that Bill Clinton duped his wife and did more to hurt himself than the VRWC could ever do.
 
I think that our language affects the way we live in the world. If we frame everything in violent terms, we affect our own health. People I know who are less flexible and more autocratic, more likely to have a stroke, use terms like 'hit enter' or 'punch list', etc. I think there is a connection between words and outlook.
 
Wow, you guys got me worried there for a while, I like you all folks in this forum and for a while I thought you guys would join this "teacher" to sing the PC song and dance the happy PC dance.... but most of the responses in the thread restores my faith in basic common sense.

Oh man, where to begin... I was actually curious and even welcome the discussion about how the terminologies are shared between photography and ballistics, but the suggestion by this "teacher" is too funny to even consider semi-seriously :)

Has this "teacher" ever seen the photo of the raising of the flag at Iwojima? To me, that picture is only one of *many* perfect juxtaposition between the shared terminology. Guns and cameras go hand in hand in many-many occassions.

More than that, has he ever ponder even for a nanosecond about that picture? Does he think that the guy *shooting* the picture was thinking, oh man, soon the enemy will come upon us and bullets will be flying everywhere, should I *photograph* this picture or just *shoot* it?

Wars are not pretty, it's the ugliest form of action a man can do to another, but it is necessary! Has he ever thought that wars are won *not* by using hugs and kisses? that for some enemies, weapons are the only answer?

I don't own any guns, probably never will, but I also do not blindfold myself thinking that all guns are evil and should be shunned. Look back as far as you can in history, and you'll see that weapons are there as far back as humankind was.

Interestingly (even ironically), in the right hands within the right context, cameras has been and still can be a weapon.

The fact that some people *ab*use guns to perform criminal act doesn't diminish the fact that taking arms is a heroic act at appropriate times. For a person who can only wish to be half as brave as the soldiers in Iraq right now, I consider it an honor, a *cool* thing to share a mere terminology!

Yeah, the "teacher"'s sentiment resonates alright... with my truck's exhaust pipe.

Now, go shoot some deadly accurate and tack sharp images, preferably with your bayonet-mount Leicas...
 
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In the Danish language, we go out to "take pictures", so that's usually the way I describe it when talking in English about it

Personally, though, I don't really see the problem, in some ways this can easily be compared to eachother, depending on how you think obviously. Saying "shoot photographs" doesn't bother me
 
In Dutch, to "shoot" in the context of photography is always derogatory: "That's just a guy who shoots some piccies", whereas the regular term is "to take photos". So somehow, all this shooting in this forum reminds me of brainless kids. This is not to say I haven't got any respect for the people on this forum: there's more knowledge and photographic capability here than on any other Internet place I've been to. But language colours our thinking. So I can sympathise with those who consider terms like "shooting kids" and "burning flags - sorry - film" disturbing.
 
I think that is either over sensitivity or just being too fussy. Not that it is wrong to like using the proper terms but the slang shouldn't make your eye twich when you hear it.
 
AusDLK said:
>Just go out and SHOOT,

I had a photography teacher that had a real problem with the gun (ie. firearm) terminology that infiltrates photography. He would have said:

Just go out and PHOTOGRAPH

I have thought a lot about this over time and try to follow his lead as best I can when I speak and write about photography.

But it is difficult since these terms have become so engrained in language. Without a doubt, using the multi-syllable word "photograph" as a verb in place of "shoot" is awkward. It takes practice to say that I have x "frames" left on a roll of film rather than x "shots".

It's hard to argue with the similarity of hunting for photographs and hunting for prey. Except in the later case, something -- or someone -- dies.

I personally don't think that this is just another case of political correctness at work but I'm curious how my teacher's philosophy resonates within RFf.
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Give me a break. what a bunch of hypocrites. Most everyone eats meat. If you saw how the meat you eat is slaughtered you would be praying that the poor beasts were only shot.
I shot pictures therefore I am.
:confused:
 
Interesting to note the association of shooting to killing. Actually the most shots
fired over the last 50 years have been at clay targets, with paper and tin cans a
distant second and thrid.
 
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