08/13/2008
Who you gonna believe? Me, or your own eyes?
Errol Morris has an enlightening op-ed piece on the NY Times site called Photography As A Weapon, on the propaganda uses of faked photography, labeling, and Photoshopping. The main topic of discussion is the addition of an extra missile to the news photo of the launching of 3 Iranian missiles.
Morris interviews a Dartmouth professor and expert on digital retouching named Hany Farid, who says in part:
...when you put out a fake, like the Kerry/Fonda one. And even like this missile one. You start putting it out there and saying, "Oh look, this picture? It's a fake. This picture? It's a fake." But you know what people remember? They don't remember, "It's a fake." They remember the picture. And there are psychology studies, when you tell people that information is incorrect, they forget that it is incorrect. They only remember the misinformation. They forget the tag associated with it. They did these great studies, especially with older people. They give them information about health, Medicare, Medicaid, that kind of stuff. And they say, "this information that you heard? It's wrong." And what ends up happening is, that information gets ingrained into their brains, and even if they are subsequently told it's wrong, they end up believing it.
The Big Lie is contained in The Big Picture.
Three Iranian missiles + Godzilla, freelancing as a mercenary.