Paul T.
Veteran
I like this photo because it says a lot about the American dream.
My first visit to the US, nearly 3 decades ago, my girlfriend and I parked our car in a lot in New Orleans. We chatted to the attendant: "you are young people, you got a lot going for you, you need to move over here! It's the greatest country in the world."
He was in his fifties and wouldn't even have been on a minimum wage, as Bill Clinton hadn't introduced it. He probably hadn't been to any place else. Still America was the best place in the world.
My first visit to the US, nearly 3 decades ago, my girlfriend and I parked our car in a lot in New Orleans. We chatted to the attendant: "you are young people, you got a lot going for you, you need to move over here! It's the greatest country in the world."
He was in his fifties and wouldn't even have been on a minimum wage, as Bill Clinton hadn't introduced it. He probably hadn't been to any place else. Still America was the best place in the world.
As I was thinking of this earlier today, I thought I missed my point a little.
Proud to be American, Proud of my Home, Proud to be Me.
Gabriel M.A.
My Red Dot Glows For You
One could say the same about getting an attractive woman (naked or otherwise) into the shot. One could say the same about anything as being a "photogenic crutch" (whatever that exactly could mean): composition, film, square format, strong contrast, B&W, high saturation, toy cameras, large format cameras, rangefinders...
That one does not like it or does not/will not/cannot master it does not make it a crutch.
Agreed: people make blanket statements based on perception and mistake it (the perception) as fact. Facts may be perceived differently, yet facts remain the same, unless even more facts come forth (or are disproved) to back them up.
Taste does not change a photograph nor its value. Its value rests on both the viewer and the maker; that both may have a different evaluation of that value is a different issue. What I think alone does not change its importance: the number of people that agree on its value and importance is what is important to that number of people.
As has been said many times before: there are rules and guidelines for a "great photograph", and masterfully disobeying them also make a "great photograph".
And like I said earlier: the title of a photograph greatly influences the viewer; there are also guidelines for titling a photo, and context is one of them. A photo here titled within the context given should have engaged the viewer within that context. Unfortunately, the buzz-wordable, power-readers and highly opinionated cared more about the title than the rest.
Last edited:
Gabriel M.A.
My Red Dot Glows For You
Valid point: what is acceptable to oneself is what matters to the viewer. Like family snapshots: they may be acceptable to oneself, regardless of it being a great picture or not.
bob338 said:
Because irony isn't acceptable to you, it doesn't indicate whether it's acceptable to others. Warhol was incredibly ironic, sarcastic and patronizing, yet he's hardly a footnote. I may not like him, but I don't dictate relevance in humanity's image history.
bob338 said:
I think Chris took a photo, and made a choice to take words from it to make it its title. People are interpreting all sorts of things. And I don't think "irony" is the point.
Paul T.
Veteran
a patriot speaks
a patriot speaks
Shame we can't embed videos here...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OldToIF5ZGs
a patriot speaks
Shame we can't embed videos here...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OldToIF5ZGs
anjoca76
Well-known
I am the first to point out and be enraged by my country's (U.S.) shortcomings, and I admire many other countries for their attributes that I wish my country would adopt--usually in regards to social welfare programs and foreign policies. But I am also very patriotic and, yes, proud to be an America, and I make no apologies for that. If I were born in Portugal or Germany or what have you, I imagine I would be equally proud to be from one of those countries too. Pride is not a bad thing, as long as it is does not lead one to blindness or ignorance. I am quite shocked (and disappointed, frankly) to see so much anti-national-pride feelings here. That's too bad.
As for the photograph itself, it's clearly a power one, as it's stirred up a whole lot of emotions here.
As for the photograph itself, it's clearly a power one, as it's stirred up a whole lot of emotions here.
Paul T.
Veteran
i whole-heartedly agree with that.
And I also wonder how often the former exists without the latter.
craygc
Well-known
its always about misdirection. If it sounds right or good and you say it often enough, the masses will adopt it. Bit like saying you're either with us or against us - sounds logical on the fly until you actually think about how absurd the logic really is.
TXForester
Well-known
O.K. We have problems, but who doesn't? Name one perfect country or culture. Should the bad negate being proud of the good? I do agree with the last statement but some pride is a good thing. You can be overly proud, but you also be overly humble. Showing pride can spur people on to continue doing good.
Disclosure FWIW: I do have and American flag displayed on my house.
Paul T.
Veteran
Fred, I'm talking about my lifetime, I realise you're older than your old avatar photo!
TXForester
Well-known
The Constitution is a good one. However, the problem with the type of thinking you mentioned is the constitution was put to paper a long time ago. The writers could not envision life today. You have to mentally stretch the constitution to interpret some of it as it relates to life today.
Also, some of the strict Consticonstitutionalists fail to see that some of the things they support don't fit the Constitution.
That is where the art of critical thinking (mentioned in a post above) comes in. Party loyalty can get in the way of using what's between the ears.
Chriscrawfordphoto
Real Men Shoot Film.
Sorry that I've been kind of gone from this discussion after posting the photo. Yesterday kept me pretty busy with some work I had to finish for a paying client. Here's why I made the picture:
I've noticed a huge increase in patriotic displays in Fort Wayne in the last year. This had happened right after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks too, but had died out soon after. Now, suddenly, I am seeing a lot more flags flying, more signs like the one in this house's window. All have one thing in common: They're in poor and working class neighborhoods in the city, some on recently abandoned homes like the one in this photograph. Patriotic displays are nearly non-existant in middle class areas, and are completely absent in wealthy areas of Fort Wayne.
Given that this mainly industrial city, Fort Wayne, has real unemployment approaching 30% due to so many factories moving to Mexico and China, I am fascinated that those who have been hurt most still love their country, while those who have benefited most, do not display any patriotism. I believe that the patriotism of the working class and poor here is genuine. The feeling among them is that America is a great country whose leaders are destroying it. The patriotism is not love of the government, it is a love of what the United States could be if we had leaders who worked for the good of all of our people.
That is something that is within living memory of even relatively young men like me. My father graduated from high school at age 18 and immediately got a job, as a lineman for the telephone company, that paid a middle class income. Today, such jobs no longer exist for the young. The jobs that young people can get pay $8 an hour. Education doesn't solve the problem, as those with degrees are often unemployable here. Nobody that I went to college with at Indiana University's Fort Wayne campus ever found a job unless they left Indiana, as I did when I moved to New Mexico a few years after I earned by bachelor's degree. My generation has been left to die, and no one here cares. The older people didn't care because at first it was only the young who couldn't get decent jobs, but now they're being thrown out of work and told to take $8 an hour jobs too...which is why you now see so many empty houses like the one in my photograph.
I have actually been photographing a lot of these patriotic displays in Fort Wayne over the last year or so. Its becoming a project.
I disagree with all those who say that patriotism is bad or fascist. It can be twisted by cynical politicians, as has happened a lot in the last decade here, but the people who are putting up these signs in Fort Wayne are not rightwing nutjobs or cynical politicians. They're ordinary Americans who think that our country really is great. Maybe they have been manipulated into thinking that, but I know that the USA can eliminate poverty and elevate the lives of those who are being hurt by our government's economic policies if we had the will to do so. Why don't the middle class and the wealthy show the kind of patriotism our working class and poor do? Some have been brainwashed into thinking that only idiots fly the flag, as so many in this thread have asserted. I think most just don't give a damn about anyone but themselves, and REAL patriotism means sticking together as a nation and working together to eliminate the problems that our country clearly has today.
My picture was not a slam on the poor; I was not making fun of the unfortunate people who lived in this house. It was a comment on the death of the 'America' that i knew where poverty was the exception, not the rule. People in places like New York disparage places like Indiana as 'fly-over country'. A place full of people to look down on for their ignorance and poverty. Th real ignorance is found in THOSE people, who have forgotten that all Americans have the right to live decent lives, and the poverty is in the souls of our cynical and morally bankrupt rulers.
I've noticed a huge increase in patriotic displays in Fort Wayne in the last year. This had happened right after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks too, but had died out soon after. Now, suddenly, I am seeing a lot more flags flying, more signs like the one in this house's window. All have one thing in common: They're in poor and working class neighborhoods in the city, some on recently abandoned homes like the one in this photograph. Patriotic displays are nearly non-existant in middle class areas, and are completely absent in wealthy areas of Fort Wayne.
Given that this mainly industrial city, Fort Wayne, has real unemployment approaching 30% due to so many factories moving to Mexico and China, I am fascinated that those who have been hurt most still love their country, while those who have benefited most, do not display any patriotism. I believe that the patriotism of the working class and poor here is genuine. The feeling among them is that America is a great country whose leaders are destroying it. The patriotism is not love of the government, it is a love of what the United States could be if we had leaders who worked for the good of all of our people.
That is something that is within living memory of even relatively young men like me. My father graduated from high school at age 18 and immediately got a job, as a lineman for the telephone company, that paid a middle class income. Today, such jobs no longer exist for the young. The jobs that young people can get pay $8 an hour. Education doesn't solve the problem, as those with degrees are often unemployable here. Nobody that I went to college with at Indiana University's Fort Wayne campus ever found a job unless they left Indiana, as I did when I moved to New Mexico a few years after I earned by bachelor's degree. My generation has been left to die, and no one here cares. The older people didn't care because at first it was only the young who couldn't get decent jobs, but now they're being thrown out of work and told to take $8 an hour jobs too...which is why you now see so many empty houses like the one in my photograph.
I have actually been photographing a lot of these patriotic displays in Fort Wayne over the last year or so. Its becoming a project.
I disagree with all those who say that patriotism is bad or fascist. It can be twisted by cynical politicians, as has happened a lot in the last decade here, but the people who are putting up these signs in Fort Wayne are not rightwing nutjobs or cynical politicians. They're ordinary Americans who think that our country really is great. Maybe they have been manipulated into thinking that, but I know that the USA can eliminate poverty and elevate the lives of those who are being hurt by our government's economic policies if we had the will to do so. Why don't the middle class and the wealthy show the kind of patriotism our working class and poor do? Some have been brainwashed into thinking that only idiots fly the flag, as so many in this thread have asserted. I think most just don't give a damn about anyone but themselves, and REAL patriotism means sticking together as a nation and working together to eliminate the problems that our country clearly has today.
My picture was not a slam on the poor; I was not making fun of the unfortunate people who lived in this house. It was a comment on the death of the 'America' that i knew where poverty was the exception, not the rule. People in places like New York disparage places like Indiana as 'fly-over country'. A place full of people to look down on for their ignorance and poverty. Th real ignorance is found in THOSE people, who have forgotten that all Americans have the right to live decent lives, and the poverty is in the souls of our cynical and morally bankrupt rulers.
Last edited by a moderator:
anu L ogy
Well-known
Saying you're proud to be an American doesn't make sense to me. Since a definded description of what an American is does not and will never exist beyond a reference to the geographical location which you were born in, I don't see the point in saying I was pround that I fell out of my mothers womb in this location.
Beyond that, you are free to make yourself what ever you want, and by that principal I'm proud to be myself.
Beyond that, you are free to make yourself what ever you want, and by that principal I'm proud to be myself.
I make similar photos in the NYC area. I'm fascinated by patriotism. I'm not the flag waving type or the sign hanging type, but after meeting people from different parts of the world, I've come to understand that I'm lucky to live in the US for multiple reasons (as much as it also sucks at times).
Last edited:
MikeL
Go Fish
Ken, who has sold you this line, why do you think they are selling it, and are you seriously interested in buying it?
Neither educated or uneducated have sole ownership of 'idiot'. To me, 'idiot' is someone who doesn't think rationally about the information available to them. Both intellectuals and non-intellectuals fail to think rationally and/or selectively ignore new information.
blw
Well-known
My sentiments exactly! There are some other terms thrown around our media these days that "sound good". But where's the consensus on how small our government should be? Which part of the government- federal, state, county, city, etc- or all of them collectively? Lower taxes? How much lower? Where's the consensus? Who's definition of these things do we subscribe to? I wonder how many people would actually like to see a larger government (take your pick on which level) than what we currently have.
Just the other day in front of Home Depot my wife pointed out a bumper sticker on a car to me. First of all, there were numerous Marines stickers on the car; but then on the bumper was a red sticker with white letters that read "DEPORT OBAMA". This man trained to fight- and likely did fight- and served under direction of some President at some time or other. And now he proudly and loudly calls for not just the removal of the current President, but for his dismissal from the country- as if he's not even a citizen. This passes for "political discourse" in our country nowadays. This is what we've sunk to.
I agree with his right to voice his opinion; but the method and the message seems a bit over the top to my not-so-highly-educated ears.
Ranchu
Veteran
MikeL
Go Fish
The extremes on both ends sell it, the extremes on both ends buy it, and rational discussion about the collective good, which both extremes are 'patriotic' about, goes down the drain.
I can understand fans from rival teams not being persuaded to switch allegiance, but one would hope for rational thinking when it comes to the common good. But yes, how naive of me!
bob338
Well-known
Agreed. None of us liberals were quiet about our dislike of the previous administration.
hipsterdufus
Photographer?
Don't want to quote all of what Chris said, but I believe he is spot-on. My dad's company is looking to move his job (machining) to China and my company just went through its 5th or 6th layoff in 3 years. Luckily, I survived. My dad is the patriotic flag-waving type and I sometimes wonder why with how much this country has screwed him (he's been laid off about 7-8 times in the last 20 years). I think Chris stated why my dad feels this way quite well: "patriotism is not love of the government, it is a love of what the United States could be if we had leaders who worked for the good of all of our people".
Either way, who knows what America will become, but I really like the series of photos that Chris has posted. They make all of us think about where our country is going.
Either way, who knows what America will become, but I really like the series of photos that Chris has posted. They make all of us think about where our country is going.
- Status
- Not open for further replies.