Martin Parr or the "Cancel Culture" at work

Colin Corneau said:

"Making assumptions and blanket judgements are wrong -- and so here's some I'm going to make to prove it!"

Let's not mistake warranted criticism and receptivity to alternate ideas (good things, we agree) with the new sanctimonious Woke puritanism that hijacks issue after issue and obliterates debate (which is needed to refine and improve societal ideas) in favour of cancellation.

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That's the perfect response. Also, "weathering criticism" is not the same as cancel culture. Criticism is fine, Here we have a book removed from publication. It is more akin to book burning than criticism. This seems to be the aim of many who regard themselves as enlightened... to get rid of "wrongthink".

raizans said:

All of these justifications for protecting racist speech are intellectually dishonest and openly hostile to POC on this forum.

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Says you.

I say it isn't.

Who's right? I have at least some relevant facts to back up my point of view. I also don't purport to speak for entire communities as though they were monoliths...speaking of "intellectually dishonest".

I was open to believing the perspective offered by detractors of the photobook, when I first heard it. Then, like the out of touch, so outdated white male that I am, I spent time reading up on the issue outside of Twitter. And I realized that one can be staunchly in favour of racial equality and still conclude the people cancelling Parr and the book he lent his name to are on a misguided power trip.

raizans said:

All of these justifications for protecting racist speech are intellectually dishonest and openly hostile to POC on this forum.

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Is "intellectually dishonest" some sort of wise ass way of saying stupid?

As for racist speech, I've been following loads of it over last 3 days, live feeds by all major networks, see no reason to believe anyone will get cancelled over any of it and am wondering: where does it end? Any reasoning is allowed and welcome, so long as at least some facts are presented along the way. Popping countless self-serving balloons ain't it.

Am I hijacking this thread? If you want to display your intellectual dishonesty, then yes. Otherwise, this thread was going to make the discussion totally moot from the get go, and I'm not blaming OP for putting it out there. Just the subject matter can only take one direction these days and those who know how much they can get away with, take that chance every time. I'm saying this in spite of seeing some really good and sensible entries here.

Current world is running in parallels, there are no cognitive discussions taking place. One can only hope it's temporary, although the price we'll all pay for it is likely to dwarf any destructive event in history.

Agreed, Witold.

What is intellectually dishonest is to think that all people of color think the same as if there was some fatality in it. This kind of reasoning is in itself racist because it reduces the determinism of any colored person to their skin color and only that.

As far as I know, everyone is free to express themselves on this forum and I have yet to read any racial discrimination. Once again, as in the case of Merdeces Baptiste Halliday and the "controversial" couple of pictures, some here (raizans and co.) project their phantasms, consider them universal and that they must be imposed on everyone as evidence. For once, this is entirely intellectual dishonest because there is have absolutely no tangible element to back up such reasoning.

Well I was hoping that raizans might answer some of the questions I posed in response to the post that was made by raizans but not only has that person not responded but I cannot now find the post. Has the person deleted it and if so, does the thread's structure simply renumber the existing posts as there is no missing number I can find?

pentaxuser

The moderators have deleted a few posts, here, so let's keep things as civil as possible,

Yes, I noticed it too. Let's do without raizans.

Maybe things "wash over " me too easily. Did raizans make other posts that were worthy of deletion? I couldn't see how the raizans post I quoted when asking for answers qualified as worthy of deletion.

pentaxuser

Maybe raizans' posts were considered more controversial than photography oriented? I don't know...

Civil society , also in democracies, has always suppressed certain opinions, for better or worse (not to speak of the legal limits of free speach). Think about the difficulty people have faced with work or personal lives associated with homosexuality, support communism or anarchism, blasphemy, the wrong religion or skin color... not to speak of things we pretty much universally consider criminal these days, but have not always. Is what Parr is facing here worse that that? He's not facing state repression, but parts of society shunning him. The equivalency with censorship, which by definition comes from the state or another authority, is false. I suppose I must repeat myself here, on the small hopes that it will help against the tendency to lump everything into two camps: I don't think the extent the campaign against Parr goes to is justified, especially the part about stopping further sales of the book - I have just stated that I think the way the pictures were juxtaposed shows bad judgement, and have made arguments for that (and so have others). If that is lumped together with attempts to quiet and exclude Paar from the public sphere, and the latter are way exaggerated, I feel that the whole decrying the demise of rational argument is a bit self-serving.
Check out all the hyperbole in this thread! Stockholm syndrome, most destructive event in history, book burning, lynching...
This certainly applies to this thread as well, and I think not to the side Colin meant:

Colin Corneau said:

From the acerbic observant RoguePhoto on (ironically) Twitter:
The only modern way to do social commentary is to pick a side; set the other side up as a monster; and annihilate the monster as loudly and as violently as possible....
In modern theory, inviting conversation is tantamount to capitulation. If you let "them" in, pretty soon it's Nazis everywhere. You cannot permit a toehold. No conversation.

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Ironically, in the same way the campaign against Parr this is being equated with censorship, one could also see the voices that vilify the campaign as attempts to stifle freedom of expression. There's no material difference in what they do. Both sides, at their extremes, are claiming the other side should not say what they're saying, however for the most part, fortunately neither side is using more than their words to stop the other. That's the extremes. I see a lot of people who are willing to have discussions. If you don't, maybe a change of scene and the media you consume is due?

If this

Dali said:

[...] some here (raizans and co.) project their phantasms, consider them universal and that they must be imposed on everyone as evidence. For once, this is entirely intellectual dishonest because there is have absolutely no tangible element to back up such reasoning.

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applies to anything in this thread, it's certainly claims such as

Witold said:

[...]One can only hope it's temporary, although the price we'll all pay for it is likely to dwarf any destructive event in history.

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What are you trying to say here, in clear words?
Such exaggerations and ominous fear-mongering do your supposed goal of promoting free speech a disservice. And so does the reluctance to acknowledge racism and the unwillingness to discuss the underlying issue. I just screams "clinging to privilege" (excuse the wording, I don't particularly like the expression, but it's the most concise way to put it).

Once again, when a teen spends 18 months trying to impose her subjectivity as being the truth, it is no longer the domain of discussion, exchange of point of view or freedom of expression, it is pure and simple ideology. As for the point she raises, there are laws for that, whether she likes it or not. I have never found, for whatever reason, media and social lynching to be an acceptable argument. In fact, it says a lot about the lack of civility of those who exercise it.

Dali said:

Once again, when a teen spends 18 months trying to impose her subjectivity as being the truth, it is no longer the domain of discussion, exchange of point of view or freedom of expression, it is pure and simple ideology. As for the point she raises, there are laws for that, whether she likes it or not. I have never found, for whatever reason, media and social lynching to be an acceptable argument. In fact, it says a lot about the lack of civility of those who exercise it.

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Well said, Dali.

It should alarm everyone that public discourse on art and important social matters are, bluntly, at such an adolescent and fundamentalist level.

It certainly alarms me that she seems to have no idea who the original photographer was (despite being quite adept at online searches) nor what he was actually saying with his pairing of the photos in question. She seems to have demanded Martin Parr censor a photographer (who is not even alive to defend his expressions) and if he wasn't going to give in to her demands then damn it, she was going to make sure it was censored regardless.

This is not the mentality and worldview of people who are going to create relevant, lasting interesting photography.

Dali said:

Yes, I stand by my words: It is anti-White racism.

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And you are right, regardless of how "offensive" someone finds this image to be.

They are attempting to erase our history and achievements in a quest to erase us.

grain elevator said:

This campaign is absolutely ridiculous and unfair. On the other hand, claims of "anti white racism" are even more ridiculous.

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You are failing to see the bigger picture here. Have you not witnessed the near daily attacks against us?

George Mann said:

Have you not witnessed the near daily attacks against us?

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Do you mean the lovers of Kodachrome when you say "us"?

grain elevator said:

... What are you trying to say here, in clear words?
Such exaggerations and ominous fear-mongering do your supposed goal of promoting free speech a disservice. And so does the reluctance to acknowledge racism and the unwillingness to discuss the underlying issue. I just screams "clinging to privilege" (excuse the wording, I don't particularly like the expression, but it's the most concise way to put it).

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No fear mongering from me. I see Portland and I close my argument. There isn't much else to say. Apparently some specific number of human lives must first be lost before that event gets noticed and connected to a lot of other issues. Clinging to privilege???? Again, Portland, and whichever way one understands ... privilege.

And all this anther proof to what I had said earlier ... this thread was doomed to land where it has.

As for Mr. Parr: I frankly don't think he knows which way the wind blows.

I was reminded of this thread when I saw this video:

grain elevator said:

I wrote "unnecessarily insulting", and that, IMHO, was not unnecessary - the taboo needed to be broken. Doing it again today would be mostly pointless. And it's very different from what we're talking about here in that the insulted party was highly privileged, rather than belonging to a discriminated group.
You're wrong claiming the perpetrators of such heinous acts (also thinking of Hendrix and Stars and Stripes here) weren't publicly shamed and character murdered. They were however mostly outside of the bourgeois society already, so it didn't affect them as much as in Parr's case.

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Beatles and The Pistols where massive, one perhaps a bit more than the other at the time of the writing of their respective songs. They were bigger than Jesus and the Queen put together. And you don't play Woodstock if you're a nothing.
All three were dangerously close to being part of the bourgeoisie, and they certainly soon became so.
The Beatles members where always middle-class and The Pistols would have been nothing without established artist/storyteller Malcolm, and they soon grew to resent him as the pupil often does. Hendrix was the highest paid rock musician ever at the time of Woodstock, so he was preaching to a very, very large choir (incidentally, much of his early success was in London).
There was nothing in particular that needed to be said about the Queen or the US military involvement back then. Not anymore than now anyhow.
Racism is a subject that needs attention then and now though. And not in the usual cosy "group huggy us against the evil world" way. But in ways that really calls attention to everyday "small" racism. Like the lady in the box, sharing a fate with her fellow people of african descent all over London, in filling out menial jobs that few genetic natives want. All the while "Guy the gorilla" is getting attention and love for doing essentially the same thing.

No.

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Yes.
Politicians today are vying dangerously close to populism, as we saw it in the thirties. Only now it's on a global scale.
The grownups left politics long ago.

That's magical thinking and a very lazy way to try to find the best argument... questioning one's own impulses is a good thing!

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There is dream time, and there is optimisation time. Rarely does these twain meet. When they do, it's often at mistake.
Remember the immortal words of Donald Knuth: Premature Optimization Is the Root of All Evil.
Ask any creative, low or high. The good idea is often something that comes in flash. You can hone it and tweak it. But to do something substantially new (IE in this case change your mind) you have to enter another mode of mind.
You very rarely have an epiphany while actually writing.

Once again you're selling your audience here short. That's all true, but obvious.

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Who is my audience exactly? And looking at the response on twitter and other social justice platforms, clearly I'm not.

You're taking my example too literally. Our argument could be more fruitful if we tried to understand the point the other is trying to make rather than dissecting the irrelevant ways it doesn't work - any analogy is incomplete.

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Appealing to autonomous “better understanding” and deep reading of your opponent in a discussion is cute, but self-defeating.
"Just understand me the right way".
How can you take that seriously?
If you want to say something, say it as clearly as you can, trying (within reason) to anticipate your readers thoughts.

I personally think that how something is meant (opens the way to biographical readings and so on, which is boring) usually doesn't matter in art, but that's of course controversial. However here we've started out on this level... oh well.
Contrary to your claims, this is not about individual, particular emotions. This is insulting to a whole group of people, qua history.
MattKing has already expressed it better than I can, but here's another attempt:
The artist is speaking a language of symbols in a way, yes? As everyone of us has experienced especially when speaking a foreign language, one can make mistakes and say something one doesn't mean to say. Something funny, something insulting - if it's grave enough, no-one will care any more what one was trying to say. You think it was intentional, to "give the spectator a jolt that makes them reconsider fondly held notions and ideas". What exactly would these be then? Do you think it's successful? I don't think it as intentional, because it should have been clear to the artist that it doesn't work that way - the hurtful thing comes to the foreground and drowns out all the other layers of the oh so polysemic imagery with all its glorious irony and hyperbole. (And here we can move it away from the teleological level - what matters is how art affects the viewer, in the end how it was meant is irrelevant.) Isn't that the core of our disagreement? Maybe you simply consider the racist trope here much less powerful and hurtful than I do...

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If the spectator of a piece of art lacks the discretion, knowledge and comprehension to appreciate the qualities it may hold, it can never be the fault of the artist.
Unless the artist insisted on having that person as an audience.
You would never make your argument if a five year old didn't like a piece of art.
But for some reason people seem to assume that in the case of art that everybody over eighteen is equal.

If you look at the whole book and indeed at the whole of Gian Butturinis oeuvre, you will realise blindingly clearly, that there is no chance that Gian Butturini was, in any way or shape, a racist or meant anything racist with the work.
If that doesn't count we have nothing further to discuss.

Anyone can chose to interpret anything as anything. And often do, out of stupidity or wilfully.

Clearly you shouldn't have stuff forced down your throat in everyday life, for a number of reasons.
But once you open an art book or enter a museum you should be ready for just about anything outside of getting physically assaulted.
You're welcome to dislike it of course. But your dislike, and especially uneducated dislike (as this most clearly is), shouldn't have severe consequences for the artist or his supporters.

There are two possibilities for the critics, and especially the father and the daughter (now that I read their comments).
Either they are gobsmackingly stupid. In which case they have no place in criticising art.
Or (more likely) they know exactly what they are doing, and are using it as a catalyst and springboard for something else, using Parr and Butturini as disposable booster rockets.

I don't know which one scares me the most.

"...using Parr and Butturini as disposable booster rockets."

Precisely. I think this is the case, myself. Like many opportunistic bullies, an easy target is seen and glommed onto.

I appreciate Martin Parrs appology. Well written and to the point. Good man.

I liked the video - it was funny, in fact quite chillingly funny

pentaxuser

Vaughn said:

I appreciate Martin Parrs appology. Well written and to the point. Good man.

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Which part did you enjoy the most?

The part where he rolls over and strips himself of any kind of integrity and courage to confront the generically frothing, but obviously moronic mob?

Or the part where he takes the opportunity to virtue signal, and lie about having noticed the ideas and implications of the spread?

The part where he accepted his ignorance and the consequences of it, rather than except it like so many appologies try to do..

Saw this the other day :
"Social media is the gamification of hate".
The most concise description of Social media I've seen yet. I almost avoid it completely now and feel better for it. It's all about scoring points whether through attacking others or being virtuous. And there is the underlying physical addiction side of it as well, which is the dopamine hit from getting those points (likes, re-tweets, trending, etc). Many say "Twitter is not real life", I sure hope it stays that way.

Vaughn said:

The part where he accepted his ignorance and the consequences of it, rather than except it like so many appologies try to do..

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If you believe he hadn’t seen the ramifications and implications of the spread, after having found the book himself, an avid collector and curator of photo books, suggested it for reprinting and being more well versed in thIs genre of photography than just about anyone else...
...Then I have an old tower I want to sell you in Paris.

Sean said:

Saw this the other day :
"Social media is the gamification of hate".
The most concise description of Social media I've seen yet. I almost avoid it completely now and feel better for it. It's all about scoring points whether through attacking others or being virtuous. And there is the underlying physical addiction side of it as well, which is the dopamine hit from getting those points (likes, re-tweets, trending, etc). Many say "Twitter is not real life", I sure hope it stays that way.

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It’s something that was noticed with the very first social computer network based social media in the seventies and eighties.
Just ask Steward Brand.
A certain kind of people will turn into monsters. People who have weak ability to look into the future and actually imagining bumping into these token objects of hate or generalizations of groups and actually discovering real persons.
People with weak imaginations to see how the future ( including future selves) will react to reading the stuff they wrote.