The Falling Man and Ethics

Like the other things we have been writing on, the photograph of the Falling Man and the Esquire story could be seen as unethical -- though not maliciously so. There are several obvious arguments that could be made against taking the photograph, and publicizing it. There are three main arguments that I will supply. The reporting was extreme, the death was gruesome, and it did not provide for the greater good.

Firstly, I remember staying up and watching the towers falling hundreds of times over the few months afterwards, with the 24/7 news cycle of the media constantly and seeing over and over the Falling Man photograph and other similar ones. This level of reporting was literally unprecidented. It was proven to cause PTSD in people who watched these events unfold time and time again. This breaks the principle of the Golden Mean.

Secondly, Kantian ethics and the Golden Rule were broken. This photograph publicizes an individual's gruesome death. I would not want my own death publicized in this way, and my final seconds being shown to billions of people. Beyond that, it could easly harm the family and families of other 9/11 victims wondering if that was their family member.

Thirdly, it breaks J. S. Mill's idea of Utilitarianism. This photo causes more harm than good, as the photograph is scarred in people's memory. It's a very dramatic and very memorable photograph, and not for it's good qualities -- for, as described in the article, the terrible (and depressing) ones.

This is someone's life, someone's death, captured in a lens in a split second. Further, it summarizes all that down to 10 kilobytes of rgb pixels on the screen of my computer or television -- and that in and of itself is also a lie.