Photographer Makes Sunbathers Angry

[bmattock]

Interesting thoughts on public photography. This is on a public beach in Delaware.

Maybe the guy is up to no good. Maybe he is a pervert. Maybe he is just exercising his right to take photographs of people in public.

Good, bad, or indifferent? Your thoughts welcome.

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks

http://www.wboc.com/Global/story.asp?S=3560960&nav=MXEFbp66

Sunbathers Irked at Unknown Beach Photographer

REHOBOTH BEACH- Rehoboth Beach sunbathers are telling one man to keep his lens to himself.

An unknown man taking pictures of women and children on Rehoboth Beach created quite a stir during the Fourth of July holiday weekend. The man was also seen looking at visitors with binoculars, after lifeguards asked him to stop. Lifeguards say they have dealt with this problem before.

"Last year we had a couple of complaints," said lifeguard Dan MacLeish. "I think this is the first one this year and it wasn't just on my beach. He went for a walk and some people also complained further down."

The police say taking pictures of other people in a public area is not considered a crime.

 

[TPPhotog]

Public is public! I bet there are more pictures shot with mobile phones every day than someone with a camera 😉

 

[bmattock]

Some might even say that a person armed with binocs and a traditional camera is less likely to be a threat than a person with a cell-phone camera or other hidden technology. There have been kinky photographers arrested for rigging hidden 'upskirt' cameras and other things like that. This fellow is out in the open. Strange he may be, upsetting, yes. I would wager that it doesn't make people comfortable to have him stare at them through binoculars or take their photo under those circumstances. Creepy, in fact. But is he dangerous to the public? Should he be forbidden from doing this? Should anyone be forbidden from taking photos in public?

Now, contrast that with England. In London right now, it may be illegal for you to take a picture of a child - even in public - even if the child is fully clothed and the photos are in no way lewd, etc, depending on the circumstances. I have been following this in the pages of AP. Some people have already been arrested, I understand.

What's next?

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks

 

[TPPhotog]

I've always found that being in full view and not lurking has resulted in people generally "forgetting" I'm there. They also have the chance to avoid being photographed if they feel so inclined. I would be very surprised these days if any pervert would use a traditional camera, unless the perversion is camera collecting of course 😉

In the UK we have the anomaly that it isn't illegal to take pictures of children, yet local authorities and organizers at events do ban it. We cannot any longer use models either professional or otherwise under 18 for anything where a jury might consider the results to be inappropriate. The a$$ of a law over here doesn't even define what inappropriate is :bang:

The world is indeed becoming a sad and paranoid place 🙁

 

[nickchew]

Sad as this seems, having 2 young daughters and watching all the horrors of disappearing children in the news these days.... I understand what all this concern is about.

I was at a children's library with my 2 daughters together with their childcare classmates. I started shooting, of course, and I was told to stop by one of the child minders because other children's images may be captured while I was taking photos of my own daughters....sigh.

Nick

 

[Pherdinand]

"Lifeguards say they have dealt with this problem before."
If i'm not mistaken, lifeguards are supposed to get folks out of the water in time. Why were they not doing their damn job, instead of looking after the photographer???

"The world is indeed becoming a sad and paranoid place " No offense intended, Tony, but the world is not limited to Delaware beaches and England. Luckily, i might say in this case. There are still lots of places where people will be GLAD to pose for you and proud and feel important that someone unknown took their photograph...
Nothing's lost folks! just well hidden🙂

 

[bmattock]

When I was a very young man, some might say that I viewed the photographs in National Geographic or the Sears or Monkey Wards catalogs with a less-than-innocent gaze.

Would this then make the photographs themselves illegal pornography? The photographers liable for arrest? In this day and age, perhaps...

Evil is in the hearts and minds of evil people. You can't restrict legal activities in the hopes that the people who put those legal activities to illegal use will then just go away - they don't. You could make ALL photography illegal - that would not stop the perverts - it would just end photography.

I never understand this mentality - we fear danger to ourselves and our children - so lets ban something. Yeah, that works.

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks

 

[Pherdinand]

Nick, i can't say anything because i'm not(yet) a parent...
However, children were disappearing always, the procentage of perverts and pedophiles and such diud not increase! JKust the coverage of bad news improved. Alas, we the public are responsable for everything we get in the news...we pay for it so we get it! Sometimes I feel ashamed when I think of this, whe I think of the large mass of low quality entertainment stuff that is pushed down on our throats, i am part of the society that seems to need it, to prefer it against true values.

 

[TPPhotog]

I agree, I spent 4 years in the Police Force over here a few years back and know for a fact that the danger has always been there and is no different today from any other time. The risk is very small yet the media make it sound like an epidemic :bang:

I had an interesting one the other day when street shooting locally. Some guy got upset that I spotted as a tourist from another part of the UK. I basically told him that I live here, I pay my local taxes, this is what we do here (Totnes is built on art and many artists live here) and that if he didn't like it he could f*** off back to his own cesspit of a city. I guess from my eyes he knew he wasn't going to win and you know what? He wouldn't!

 

[Pherdinand]

Would this then make the photographs themselves illegal pornography? The photographers liable for arrest? In this day and age, perhaps...

Exactly, Bill. You still see lots of photos of semi- or fully naked women and children in a magazine like National Geographic.
I ask what exactly is the difference between taking a photo of naked 3 years old Jimmy Dludlu in Ghana, and taking a photograph of naked 3 years old John Smith in Delaware? Nothing! But still, i bet plenty of people in Delaware pay for the next issue of the National Geography, and don't consider it an erotic magazine.

I hope i don't hurt anyone... You can pick the Netherlands, or HUngary, or whatever, instead of Delaware and Ghana, of course.

 

[Pherdinand]

Pff, my spelling sucks😀 Sorry folks, it's midnight here and it's another keyboard I'm using

 

[nickchew]

Nick, i can't say anything because i'm not(yet) a parent...
However, children were disappearing always, the procentage of perverts and pedophiles and such diud not increase! JKust the coverage of bad news improved. Alas, we the public are responsable for everything we get in the news...we pay for it so we get it! Sometimes I feel ashamed when I think of this, whe I think of the large mass of low quality entertainment stuff that is pushed down on our throats, i am part of the society that seems to need it, to prefer it against true values.

Pherdinand
Don't get me wrong, I said I can understand the concern, I'm not saying that it is right to stop people from shooting photos.

Nick

 

[Pherdinand]

I know, i know, Nick...i'm just venting🙂

 

[XAos]

The mothers of kids thing was my first thought, its really the primary concern here, and that's been addressed by others already.

But I can't help but wonder how many of those protesting were women wearing revealing swimsuits that they bought and wear for the purpose of attracting attention from strangers. Ever gotten rude stares from someone wearing shorts or a shirt with words printed on them? If you dont want people looking, dont put words on your butt. Heck we can't even make a bikini that only attractive women can wear, there's no way we can make one that will only appeal to people the wearer finds attractive.

 

[bmattock]

The mothers of kids thing was my first thought, its really the primary concern here, and that's been addressed by others already.

But I can't help but wonder how many of those protesting were women wearing revealing swimsuits that they bought and wear for the purpose of attracting attention from strangers. Ever gotten rude stares from someone wearing shorts or a shirt with words printed on them? If you dont want people looking, dont put words on your butt. Heck we can't even make a bikini that only attractive women can wear, there's no way we can make one that will only appeal to people the wearer finds attractive.

You brought up an interesting point, and one which gets me in trouble with the opposite sex from time to time. But what the heck, here goes.

Many women dress to be attractive. To whom? To men. Ah, but only the men that the particular woman finds acceptable. If any OTHER man dares to find her attractive - that's sexual harassment. So, only ugly men can sexually harass a woman. If she likes the attention, then it is ok.

Best Regards,

Bill Mattocks

 

[RML]

What I find is that, here in Amsterdam at least, it's mostly women and "cool" guys of Moroccan decent who complain about my photography. I don't know if this has a foundation in religion or a need to defend assumed personal rights or perhaps just a personal dislike to being photographed. Whatever it is, I saw a photog recently who handled such an encounter in a really good way. I've learned from that.

Anecdote. A couple of days ago squaters had laid claim on a house which they considered to be abandoned for over a year. As it is, the top floor is a studio for some DJ and he got quite irate when he returned home. Some fistycuffs (sp?) ensued, some pulling and pushing, a dog bit him, and the police came over. I had a perfect view from my window and used my Eos 300D with Sigma 70-300 for some close-ups. Some neighbourhood children saw me shooting and started shouting I couldn't just shoot, that I needed permission. In reply I shouted it's a public place and don't need no stinkin' permission of anyone. This got them more worked up. 🙂 Police aplenty in the street, so they ran over to the officers and complaned. These officers turned around, scanned the houses til they found me and waved. 😛 Needless to say these kids were silenced by that. A bit of muttering later and they all were quiet.

Oh, to finish the story, in the end, after long discussions with the police, the squaters left the house and the DJ could get back in again. He's filing chargers and damages.

 

[Allen Gilman]

This topic seems to be getting more and more interesting, especially in light of Philip Lorca-DiCorcia's case where a man is sueing him for taking his photo on the street w/out any consent. What makes this case particularly interesting is that DiCorcia set up lights and photographed people walking in dark areas under scaffolding for construction, almost in a portrait fashion - very tight crops of head and shoulders. The work ended up in a book called "Heads." On a thread at PNet, some people voiced concerns that the photo is just as intimate as a portrait, and that they, too, would have felt their privacy intruded upon. It is just this reaction that is telling about the sophistication of DiCorcia's project as it seems to nearly dissolve any kind of distinction between "Portraiture" and "Street photography." For myself personally, this kind of throws words like "privacy" and "public" into question as you really start to wonder where it all ends and begins. A very interesting project.

 

[XAos]

I figured that would crop up sooner or later. The key difference here is that existing law recognized a difference in the right to take a picture in public, and the right to publish a recognizeable likeness of someone for commercial use.

 

[Allen Gilman]

In a sense, there is no key difference. DiCorcia's photos were not for "commercial use" just as any documentary photography book would not be considered "for commercial use."

 

[nwcanonman]

This topic seems to be getting more and more interesting, especially in light of Philip Lorca-DiCorcia's case where a man is sueing him for taking his photo on the street w/out any consent. What makes this case particularly interesting is that DiCorcia set up lights and photographed people walking in dark areas under scaffolding for construction, almost in a portrait fashion - very tight crops of head and shoulders. The work ended up in a book called "Heads." On a thread at PNet, some people voiced concerns that the photo is just as intimate as a portrait, and that they, too, would have felt their privacy intruded upon. It is just this reaction that is telling about the sophistication of DiCorcia's project as it seems to nearly dissolve any kind of distinction between "Portraiture" and "Street photography." For myself personally, this kind of throws words like "privacy" and "public" into question as you really start to wonder where it all ends and begins. A very interesting project.

..........................................
Legally, in the USA anyway, there is no question. If you are out of your house (in PUBLIC), anyone can take your picture (not trespassing or looking through your windows) and there should be no dispute. I believe the term is "reasonable expectation" of privacy. You and I may have differances of "reasonable", but the law is pretty clear.
And Bill,
I'm with you. If a person, male or female, doesn't want just anyone looking at their "anatomy" then keep it covered. Otherwise expect to be LOOKED at by anyone, including fat old men like me. 😛