Take photos of one of the most popular tourist spots in Seattle (the Ballard Locks) because you are "working on an assignment for an introductory photography class at Shoreline Community College", talk to some friendly officers of the Seattle police and to agents from the Department of Homeland Security, "all with guns holstered on their hips", who finally take away your pix ("You really don't have a choice") and soon after you are not "allowed to take photographs at the Locks, and that he was not to return to the Locks without advance notice and permission."
This happened to Ian Spiers, a Seattle freelance graphic designer and amateur photographer ("Humiliated, Angry, Ashamed, Brown"). Full report: Seattle Times, "Photo student draws attention of authorities", by Sara Jean Green and Katherine Sather.
The blog of Ian Spiers, "Brown Equals Terrorist", has more details with a link to a recent AP article "Photographer's rights violated?" by Elizabeth M. Gillespie:
The National Press Photographers Association has gotten numerous reports from members who say they've been hassled by police since the Sept. 11, 2001.
In early June, about 100 photographers crowded onto Manhattan subway trains and snapped pictures of each other in protest of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's proposed ban on photos on public transit.
Brian Fitzgerald, the chief photographer at the Yakima Herald-Republic, said a uniformed security officer tried to stop him from taking a picture of an immigration office, citing a "law," then calling it a "directive" that gave the officer the right to confiscate film with photos of federal facilities.
"I'm not outraged because I didn't get to the point where I didn't get my photos," Fitzgerald said. "It just reminds me again how much disinformation there is, even in these agencies that are supposed to know."
Another report from The Stranger: "TAKING PICTURES WHILE BROWN, Securing the Homeland Against Shutterbugs", by Amy Jenniges:
After Spiers snapped a few frames, a security guard walked up and started asking questions. "He wasn't politely asking me questions," Spiers says. "He'd accessorized his ensemble with a 90-pound German shepherd, and was talking at me."
[...]
Spiers hasn't heard back from authorities at the Locks, so he's staying away for now, and throwing all of his free time into getting his story out. "I haven't come up for air. All I'm doing is putting it out there," he says.
What would have happened, if Ian would have used a 5 MP Cameraphone and mailed his pix to a moblog site...would they take down the site?
[© Image by Narushige Shiode, The Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis, University College London] (Thx to Leif Skoogfors)
