----- Original Message -----
From: "Cotty"
Subject: Re: UK: Photographer films his own 'anti-terror' arrest, February
2010
Simply that the idea that someone may not be photographing just for
personal pleasure anymore - and in fact may be pursuing a line of
illegality - eg recce of a building entrance, or snapping up little
girls' skirts, means that the public are more aware of such activities,
and rightly or wrongly are more likely to highlight innocent activity to
the authorities.
And who has planted the idea thar a person may be taking pictures for
illegal purposes?
I think with relation to pointina camera up a little girls skirt, the action
would be pretty obvious, we had a guy here when I was a teenager that got
popped for doing just that, and he was dealt with, without the hysteria that
now surrounds SLR cameras but, inexplicably, no other type of device. But
how many, pray tell, pictures have been used by terrorists to case out and
plan an attack?
Mark mentioned one.
Do youi not think that one cell phone picture is justification for harassing
one particular group of people? Especially a group that uses equipment that
has no relationship to the type of equipment used in that one incident?
If you want to have a whit of logic, ypou should be advocating the banning
of cameras in cell phones.
Someone seemingly 'acting suspiciously' (define that - ha!) in a crowd
environment is more likely to attract attention in 2010 than only 20 or
30 years ago from people who are more aware and informed by the media.
20 or 30 years ago much fewer people were aware that there are people
about who photograph children in compromising situations (for example)
and even though the activity itself has probably been going on for ages,
the awareness has only increased relatively recently. Similarly the
photographing of bridges, buildings etc. I pass no judgement on it being
right or wrong, just that that is what I see has happened.
Tell you a story. I was filming in the centre of a city and we had
finished and I was putting my kit away in the back of the land rover. As
I drove away I noticed a strange woman looking at me and thought she was
just staring because I was pulling out perilously close to her car or
something. Next day I had a phone call from the police - was asked if I
could meet them in a car park that I would be passing close to that day.
Turns out that the woman had seen something she thought was a gun being
holstered and put away in the back of my land rover! The police had done
some digging based on my vehicle registration (license plate) and seeing
what I did for a living, assumed a mistake in the lady. They were doing
a 'soft stop' on me to check. I figured out what the lady had seen, I
have a microphone and holder with wind-gag that look like this:
<http://tinyurl.com/notagun>
and before it goes in the case the wind gag (the furry part) often needs
adjusting up tight (looks like a gun going into a holster). We all had a
good laugh about it - and the copper said he had thought it would be
something like this - had done the digging and decided a soft stop was
in order rather than a 'hard stop' which would have involved armed
police stopping me in an uncompromising manner - slightly scary.
However, common sense prevailed (as did my website, which they looked at
in assessing the situation) and we went away chuckling.
My point is that the system worked.
The system didn't work.
Or more to the point, why does a guy who might have a gun get a "soft stop"
and a guy with a camera gets tossed in a cell?
Are you not seeing a disconnect in logic here?
William Robb
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