Ethics of homeless photography
San Francisco is full of photographers. I talked to two other photographers on one of the days I was shooting, and we discussed the ethics of capturing the homeless.
They began with asking why I was capturing the homeless and I talked about how I wanted to set an example for people who have different opinions than me; To get up and go actually talk to these people, as they are beautiful people with stories and insight no different than anyone else. I want to normalize being accepting of these people as they deserve to be treated with respect. I have had numerous people in this community tell me that men and women walk by and spit on them, cuss them out and kick them, and for me to just say hi to them significantly uplifted their day. I acknowledge the existence of every homeless person I make eye contact with by smiling, waving, or head nodding just as we have been taught to do when passing random people in university or in a store out of politeness. It’s normal to subtly grin at passing strangers so to change that because you feel threatened by someone’s appearance or status is wrong. Street smarts are no longer a thing it is now just “Don’t talk to strangers.” Recognizing when someone or something is actually a legitimate threat is very important and should not be discredited in learning. Most people nowadays would rather assume off the bat that something is a threat, rather than to slightly risk finding out if there is any chance its not. I know a lot of people who walk around very fear based and they miss a lot of opportunities connecting with beautiful people because of it. I think having technology/phones on and around us all the time makes this worse. People are constantly talking on their phones with people that they already know, limiting how much our world really has the possibility to connect. We’ve denormalized communicating with strangers which is sad because a lot of the best things I’ve learned have come from complete strangers from all ages and walks of life. I want to encourage people to talk to more strangers but also want to advocate that this includes the homeless community, and we can learn a lot from them too as they are also apart of our community. Whether anyone likes it or not, they also happen to be people walking the earth, meaning we have a lot more in common, than we don’t.
Another thing to remember is how you view the people you judge and how you choose whom to judge. Most homeless people have been through the ringer of life and when your good friend is going through it, do you judge them? Probably not. You most likely just try to be there for them, to believe in them. And your friend is probably lucky to have that support in their life. Having someone who believes in you, can mean everything. Other people are not so lucky to have that support.
The power that hope has on someones life is huge. Having hope in people can also be hard because oftentimes you give up so much of your own hope to someone who is not taking care of themself that its no longer worth it for you- it can become draining. Many people among the homeless community have lost hope, or all sources of hope. It is not our place as strangers to assume or judge the reason in which that hope is gone. It is more our job as humans to protect what we can see and provide the simple hope that we can, just by being kind. Being kind to a stranger in need is a powerful and incredibly easy way of instilling hope. People need to remember the kinds of things one goes through to end up on the streets, and the lack of love and warmth that can be felt once you’re there. Oftentimes when someone sees a homeless person, they immediately resort to “crackhead,” or “tweaker.” The ignorance and insensitivity in these statements saddens me and is not corrected enough. On one hand, many of these people have disabilities that put them in positions of homelessness. Others have had incidents such as car accidents, trauma resulting in brain injury or abuse that landed them in the mind state that they are in, it’s not always drugs. And on the other hand, when it does come to drugs, addiction is one of the most human experiences one can go through. Think about how incredibly human it is to fall victim to a substance that distracts us from our experience on this earth; An experience that is growing exponentially harder to keep up with. It is natural to need an escape. Although it is not our responsibility, it is not our right to judge either.
When it comes to the ethics of shooting homeless people on drugs, pretty much what you see is what you get. By this I mean you are determining the type of content you are viewing on your own. What your brain is thinking, is all you are viewing. You may view photography of homeless and think it is exploitive and insensitive. If that’s how you see the photo, that’s what you’ll make of it. Personally I view photography as an eye of truth. You can pose as much as you want for the camera but to a raw eye and mind, they’ll see right through you. Candid photos are no different. If you take a photo of a busy street, one may see a photo of a busy street, but another may be breaking down every action in the photo, getting glimpses of numerous lives from one perspective. Photography is visual documentary. There is a reason why war photographers go frontline- Those photos of tragedy are not for aesthetics. Nevertheless, there is an approach to take when shooting anything. Make conversation, ask permission. Your most respectful bet is not to snap a secret photo and then run away, nor will you learn near as much. However, nothing is set in stone. Photography is an art form and you have the power to portray what you want so long as you are being respectful and doing so with genuine intent. In the end, you are only portraying others’ subjective perspectives of the truth. Who can really blame you for that? Dorothea Lange, a famous photo journalist from the Great Depression era once said “The camera is an instrument that teaches people how to see without a camera.” Despite what you may think, in photography, truth can come before beauty.