Sociological Photography Monday August 15, 2005
Our age is the age of criticism, to which everything must be subjected. The sacredness of religion, and the authority of legislation, are by many regarded as grounds of exemption from the examination of this tribunal. But, if they are exempted, they become the subjects of just suspicion, and cannot lay claim to sincere respect, which reason accords only to that which has stood the test of a free and public examination – Kant: The Critique of Pure Reason, Preface, 1781
I like this photo, but in another respect dislike it. It’s impossible to look at it without reference to sociological and political issues, that are like a conversation you’ve heard a hundred times.
I find it quite tiresome how we are all supposed to be ethnically aware, inclusion-oriented, equal opportunities citizens. That is, we have to be explicit and declamatory all the time, about what for the majority of decent citizens is obvious and assumed. People are fundamentally equal and mostly OK, regardless of skin colour and cultural background. There will always be racists, and politically correct rhetoric will not prevent it: you can’t legislate on people’s private feelings. For the most part the UK is a reasonably harmonious multi-cultural place, and people don’t have the time, interest or inclination to “discriminate” purely on the basis of ethnicity. We get along. A mixed race friend once said most of the time, he forgot about his colour: just as I barely notice it, and care even less. Another black friend – younger, temperamentally softer and female, once mentioned racism and I found myself counselling her gently, that the racist minority will always exist. It made me sad that my friend had experienced this. But for the majority of the time, it wasn’t a problem for her.
In certain kinds of jobs, multi-cultural issues are an explicit component of initial recruitment. More than once, I’ve had to demonstrate or express the idea that I understand and accept them. What tires and annoys me about this is how it’s predictable, constantly repeated, and because for the majority of people it’s a statement of the obvious – by making it an issue it becomes an issue. It’s as if for the last two decades we’ve been feeling so guilty about previous times when Enoch Powell was influential, Alf Garnett characters were real, or further back when the slave trade existed and Britain played its part – that now, we have gone to the other extreme and have to continually make it clear amongst ourselves that we’ve moved on. Well, we have moved on and don’t need to keep going on about it.
What you see in this photo (or rather, the criticism it contains) is not racist, but humanistic. I was photographing the bright, colourful display (I’d asked permission) and the Moslem working behind it smiled brightly, making me aware of her presence. I missed the smile – which was nice – but realised including her in the shot was an interesting addition. I had no intentions to make a political or ideological statement, or a documentary image, but that’s what I created: full of sad irony, illustrating the primitive and oppressive nature of traditional Islam. I hate this subject, hate the fact that it plays such a big part in the news from all around the world, and yet here it is so it deserves a few explanatory words.
There’s a current trend in photography, much of it deriving from colleges and universities, where these sociological issues are esteemed as pre-eminently legitimate. If a student documents an ethnic group or a disenfranchised minority, and they execute it skilfully, it’s likely to attract good grades. This is sociological photography and in some respects reinforces and maintains the issues, in the same way you have to demonstrate your comprehension of equal opportunities at job interviews. If a student spent several weeks making beautiful landscapes, it would be regarded as less impressive or ‘relevant’. Society is obsessed with these sociological problems.
I generally avoid these subjects, do not pursue them photographically, but they inevitably arise as you walk around city streets. The issues and the conflicts are publicly obvious, but there are two ways of approaching it that provide a more encompassing and penetrating understanding. I believe the clash of civilisations we are currently seeing in relation to Islam concerns two factors, neither of which are specific to this or any other religion, but are currently being dramatised in relation to it. They are humanitarian, the best expression of modernity based on humanistic liberal values: the struggle between individualism and individual freedom and group and tribal conformity; and between separatist non-integration and what I describe as an evolving cultural ecology, whereby the implications and repercussions of any group of people are increasingly having wider impact, beyond their own internal culture. Thus in the Middle East oppression of women is widespread and severe, but doesn’t impact on wider civilisation. Over the last fifty years, mass migration created multi-cultural society all around the world, and Middle Eastern values were exported to secular cultures. What was once localised and specific is now international and ecological: retrogressive attitudes are located in modern societies, and what we are currently seeing is the frictions this creates and – in my opinion –violent religious protests are partly explained as a reaction against the ecological adjustments those cultures will have to make, when they are embedded in more enlightened social contexts where – for example – women are regarded as political, social and sexual equals.
Like many people, I dislike the idea of a homogenous Western culture exported from the US all around the world when it contains commercialism, corporate exploitation, and superficial capitalist values. I don’t like seeing MacDonald’s hamburgers everywhere you look. The conventional argument against US or Western cultural imperialism is that the culture is arrogant, bankrupt and driven by corporate materialism. I agree with that but think it’s not as polarised because this suggests, by implication, that ethnic and non-Western cultures deserve as much respect and esteem. There’s good and bad in both, but the individual freedoms and democratic expression within Western culture is a real achievement, and the tribal conformities and social oppressions within other cultures are primitive and questionable. I don’t believe that Iran or Saudi Arabia compares favourably to any British city, or even San Francisco or Los Angeles. It is absurd that Moslems complain about clothing bans in France – a secular society entitled to do it if it causes social problems – but fail to complain that Saudi Arabia makes it illegal not to wear it. And then you have to fit into their Moslem culture – the penalties can be severe if you don’t. Nor do I accept the notion that this debate concerns materialism versus spiritual values, because I do not agree that religions are ‘spiritual’. What understanding you see in these institutions lies in the esoteric core – in my opinion – and not in the mass rituals and enforced conformity. Thus in Islam you have to look at Sufism, and in Judaism you have to look at the kaballa. Both of which are not widely accepted within their associated religion, because the concepts and teaching principles are considerably more sophisticated and subtle than the religions either allow or comprehend.
In conclusion then, it’s not that I don’t understand or can’t speak about these subjects but rather, that they vex and tire me because they are normally conducted in such a regimented, predictable and partisan fashion. I understand the kind of photography that pursues sociological and political issues – and I don’t like it. I’ll leave it for others to pursue.
Ironically I took the photo illustrating the concept of ‘choice’; I was attracted to the array of bright fabrics. What I achieved was an image depicting bright, happy, freedom of expression, and the dark, depressing, enforced garb of a primitive social tradition. I have a feeling that her nice smile I failed to capture would be a more frequent feature on her face, if she were allowed to buy and wear these pretty clothes that – yes – attract the eye of men, because it’s fun, because it’s nice, because individual and equal sexuality is a natural and enjoyable aspect of relaxed modern living. In parts of the Middle East the cover-up cloths are actually necessary, if women wish to avoid violence and recrimination for being a ‘whore’. But men aren’t pelvic-driven demons inescapably attracted to pretty hair or nice curves, and women shouldn’t be treated as potential harlots or marital property. In the West, we’re considerably more evolved in the way we conduct gender relations, taking responsibility for our own choices and behaviour as opposed to being dictated to by tribal conformity.