Pictures of Violence
CrowdSource 7.15.2024
Welcome to CrowdSource, your weekly guided tour of the latest intellectual disputes, ideological disagreements and national debates. This is not a normal week: Below are some reflections on the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump.
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Calm before the Storm
“People were holding hands and I heard some praying,” writes Teresa Mull in a first-hand account of the assassination attempt. “Shock, disbelief, obviously confusion. But to me they seemed calmer that I would expect.”
We hope that ideals can change history. We’re often flattering ourselves when we think that they do. Just as often it’s a man with a gun that changes the course of events.
For several years, Americans have been on tenterhooks, expecting a definitive catastrophe. Today, forty-eight hours after the most significant act of political violence in two decades, we brace ourselves for its consequences.
America the Violent
Why have there been so many political assassinations, and assassination attempts, in the United States — a country with a relatively stable constitutional order, where peaceful transitions of power are the norm, rather than the exception?
53 successful killings. According to a 2009 study, three countries share the world record for most political assassinations between 1875 and 2004: Spain, the Dominican Republic, and the United States.
Low Expectations. Last year, watchdog groups warned of the rising threat of political violence.
The Lethal Symptoms of Health. On June 5, 1968, Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated in Los Angeles. That night on the Dick Cavett Show, a popular evening talk show, a distinguished panel discussed American violence. It is a fascinating historical document. One comment stands out, from a then-53 year-old broadcast journalist named David Schoenbrun:
What’s wrong with our country is not its basic health, but its way of life. And I think we must address ourselves to our way of life and where we stand today. For I cannot and will not believe that this was simply an accidental incident of one demented man. The coincidence is too strong. It’s part of the climate of violence in which we have been living for too long.
“You Talkin’ to Me?” For those who want to understand American violence, Martin Scorsese’ 1976 masterpiece, Taxi Driver, remains an essential and prophetic cultural touchstone.
The Power of an Image
Trump, bloodied and flanked by scrambling Secret Service agents, defiant and raising a fist: the extraordinary snapshot by AP photographer Evan Vucci has already earned iconic status. “I knew that this was a moment of American history that had to be documented,” the photographer said. But in politics, especially democratic mass-politics, a picture is more than a historical document. A great photograph can inspire and mobilize supporters for years — for better or worse.
Historical Pivots. A few momentous photographs changed American history by the strength of their beauty or power. Soldiers raising the flag in Iwo Jima. A Vietnamese girl burning from napalm. Students crying out in Kent State. But some momentous-seeming photographs are deceptive — and politicians know it. Consider how different shots from the same G7 conference tell different stories.
Photographs can lie. “The idea that a picture ‘never lies’ is a powerful – and inaccurate – adage. For they do not always tell the whole story. And the fact that images may be strategically constructed, manipulated or chosen carefully to convey an impression, can often go unnoticed by the people looking at them.”
Beyond Vucci’s photo, several other photographs from that horrible day are going viral, popular no doubt because they pack a political punch. Discerning citizens beware: pictures stir emotions. Even if those emotions are noble and good, we still have to think critically about the photo that caused them.
What a photograph can do. “The picture-story involves a joint operation of the brain, the eye and the heart,” explains the legendary Magnum photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson. “The objective … is to depict the content of some event which is in the process of unfolding, and to communicate impressions.”
Vucci’s photo captures the drama of the unfolding electoral season. But we keep looking at it because it also captures what we’re feeling. Whether you see in it a hero or a tyrant, Vucci’s photograph is the picture of dread.
See you next week.
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