At My Lai: The Photographer Who Captured the Massacre
I was surprised by how much war footage and gut-wrenching videos I could find online. More people should be exposed to those documents as a form of shock therapy. It gives weight and meaning to words so effortlessly spoken by our leaders. It might also help young people have a little more empathy for actual individuals, as opposed to abstract demographics.<p>The article reminds me of <i>War against War!</i>. It&#x27;s a 1924 anti-war photobook (180 images) designed by German pacifist Ernst Friedrich. It&#x27;s a sobering read. <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;craigritchie.co.uk&#x2F;archives&#x2F;2581" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;craigritchie.co.uk&#x2F;archives&#x2F;2581</a> [WARNING: 18+ NSFL]<p>EDIT: I added a few quotes describing the <i>War against War!</i> photobook.<p>&gt; <i>Outraged by the unprecedented barbarism and massive destruction of the First World War, Ernst Friedrich complied and published a collection of pictures and other visual material which attempted to illustrate not only the tragic human consequences of war, but also the lies and hypocrisy of the social, political, and economic forces that produced and promoted it. Aimed at an international audience with multi-lingual supporting text and captions, it was one of the first concerted photographic expressions of protest against the barbarism of modern warfare in all its tragic folly.</i><p>&gt; <i>Friedrich’s strategy was to present shocking images of the atrocities of war and then juxtapose the official German patriotic and military propaganda and rhetoric of the time with graphic illustrations of what this discourse actually produced.</i><p>&gt; <i>The horrific imagery builds gradually, commencing with illustrations of children’s toys and propaganda posters, followed by photographs of the soldier’s march to war, the privilege of the elites orchestrating the violence, the devastated and then forgotten battlefields [...] and the graveyards of the dead.</i><p>&gt; <i>The most unbearable pages are in a section called ‘The Face of War’, twenty-four close-ups of military and non-military survivors with huge facial wounds.</i><p>&gt; <i>Never before had the people there been subjected to such horrendous images of the savagery and the senseless destruction of the First World War. During WW1, most European governments forbade the publication of war photographs and few images of the war had appeared before the publication of Friedrich’s book.</i>