Find some examples of news stories where ‘citizen journalism’ has exposed or
highlighted abuses of power. How do these pictures affect the story, if at all? Are these pictures objective? Can pictures ever be objective?
Write a list of the arguments for and against. For example, you might argue that these
pictures do have a degree of objectivity because the photographer (presumably)
didn’t have time to ‘pose’ the subjects, or perhaps even to think about which
viewpoint to adopt. On the other hand, the images we see in newspapers may be
selected from a series of images and how can we know the factors that determined
the choice of final image?
Think about objectivity in documentary photography and make some notes in your
learning log before reading further.

This is the first time I have come across the term “citizen journalism” and it appears I am familiar with this sort of activity but not necessarily the term. I lived and grew up in Zimbabwe where “citizen journalism” is something that has helped to get the truth out to the rest of the world about the corrupt dictatorship government and the abuse of power among the military and the police to enable them to silence protesters. 

Photos taken that expose abuse of power will have an emotional effect on the audience, these images often provoke outrage and anger, in the world of “fake news” and the use of this to promote a cause or an individual, these sort of images create the desired effect of lots of sharing of images and also comments. A strange irony exists around this concept, where the citizen journalist could become the one who is abusing power by circulating shocking images for self promotion rather than highlighting an issue. 

There are pros to this approach in that it highlights injustices and can be a catalyst for positive change, but this approach can be an emotional response by protestors to years of suffering and therefore one sided, so I don’t think these photos can ever be objective. There are also situations where there are violent attacks by ordinary citizens against the police, looting of shops and destruction of buildings and vehicles during these protests, these photos are not taken, or if they are taken, they are not shared to show a balanced approach to the story telling. 

Objectivity in documentary photography, 

Objectivity must be difficult if it is about human or animal suffering of any kind and the nature of the relationship the photographer has with the subject(s), the closer the relationship the more difficult it becomes to remain objective.Photography has become a very powerful medium to communicate human or environmental issues, with this comes the responsibility of the photographer to produce work that is objective. 

It’s important to remember the note from the coursework content, that when we look at an image, we are not looking at the actual scene but a piece of paper with various subjects within it, this is just one version of reality, reality and the image we see before us are very different things and tell very different stories