Once again, I am word by word with Mr. Contreras, who posted this:
Dear friends, colleagues, detractors, family and my love Therese, To those who care about this and to those who don’t, This is a very confuse time for me, and probably for some of you as well. I’m involved in the latest scandal that has gone through the news media networks. I took a wrong decision once as I was covering the war in Syria and I’m facing the consequences now. I’m ashamed about that, but I’m not ashamed about doing what I strongly believe is my duty in life, as a simple person and as a photographer. I didn’t try to hide my mistake. I prevented one of the AP editors from using the altered picture recently and it brought me severe consequences in my working relationship with the news agency. I don’t want to excuse myself for doing something that is vigorously penalized by the purity of photojournalism. I’m a living example for colleagues, novel photographers and aspirants of photojournalism of what is not correct to do. Please take my unfortunate decision as a golden lesson. The Industry will be shaken for a while, but as part of life, we need the public punishment to teach others. I’m still the same person that I was when I got recognition for what I’ve done in Syria or anywhere else. I’m still in the same place where I was when I started collaborating with the AP. Nothing has changed for me in terms of what I assume as my duty in life and my commitment to document what I perceive as the breaking moments for our history. I will keep on doing what I did before and after AP. The Industry creates all those myths and characters, and I mentioned how risky it is to be in the position under the highlights. We are not the story, but we are always turned in to the story by the Industry. The AP team took their decision following their policy and standards. They could not do anything else, except this, and I respect their decision. I did a mistake and I assume this mistake as part of what I’m still learning. In a perfect world I would not feel even the need to go to those horrible places to document the human disaster. I know the situation that happened bothers to so many, to those people I can only say I’m sorry, but my decisions are not intended to please you and to please anybody else, my engagement is with Krishna and with the understanding of the world that many colleagues and I, who risk our lives, do to build a visual memory of our time. Nobody asked me to go to those places and risk my life to get a story, to photograph, I did it by myself, and as a consequence I have to assess every single moment the result of my own decisions. As a moral engagement when I go wrong, I apologize for it, and I have to account for my wrong actions. I carry out my duty and my work and I don’t ask you to consider my life, I ask you to don’t close your eyes to the suffering and injustice of this world. I don’t ask you to put me either on the highest pedestal or under the lowest consideration. I’m not the story. I don’t believe that we, as witnesses, are the story. If I did a mistake, then I assume it, but this does not mean that I give up. For the entire world, if I make a mistake, or if this is made by any of us, we cannot stop at this, our commitment is even more important than this. With love and respect to all of you, Narciso Contreras Hare Krishna!!!
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