At 10:23 AM 10/26/2005, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Seeing these pics from the SF outing has led me to a thought. I believe
it's easier to take pictures of people in public places when you're
accompanied by at least one other photographer. To oversimplify and
exaggerate: Being part of a group taking photos means you're on a photo
outing or you're doing this for some particular reason, therefore you're
not just a pervert:-). Seriously, at least as part of a group you have the
psychological support of others being intrusive right along with you.
Perhaps it wouldn't work that way for everyone. But I find that it works
that way for me.
I agree with you. Having other photographers along does make things easier.
Heck, just having another _person_ with you makes things easier, whether
the other person has a camera or not.
In addition to the thinking you outlined above, there are a couple other
potential factors at work here:
1)
For members of the general public, it takes more nerve to confront and
harass a group of photographers, than to harass a single photographer. Even
if they think the photographers are being intrusive, they will be less
likely to confront a group than an individual.
2)
The more photographers that people see in a given location, the more of a
"common" sight it is. People tend to associate "common" with "normal", and
"normal" with "safe" or "acceptable." This isn't always a valid
association, but it does happen.
I believe that even many police officers would treat a group of
photographers somewhat differently than they would treat a single photographer.
It seems that most people mistakenly assume that all perverts and
troublemakers are "loners". How many times have you heard an FBI criminal
profile that described a wanted person as a "loner" - vs. - "a social
butterfly, and the life of the party"? :)
Just because you are by yourself, and the only person taking pictures, this
automatically makes you "strange" in the minds of some people. It isn't
fair and it isn't logical, but as someone on this list recently said, the
paranoid have no need of logic. ;)
take care,
Glen
