Photo Manipulation and Ethics

Summary:

     This story is about how photoshopping pictures can be an offense and can cause people to lose their jobs. In many cases around the world, including the U.S., Israel, Lebanon, and other countries in the Middle East, photographers have photographed an altered the image of an important event that was in the newspaper. Many of the cases were about how they added or replaced objects or people in the photograph, portraying an unrealistic image. 

    

      In my opinion, this type of photoshop is unethical because by changing something important, the picture could be representing something false that didn't happen. For example, if I took a picture of the president giving a speech, then replaced his face with someone else's, then the picture is a false representation of what happened that day. Personally, I would want to look at a photograph in a newspaper that wasn't altered, so that I would know that what I saw in the picture really happened. I think that as long as the editor doesn't replace, heavily alter, or remove anyone or anything in the picture, then he or she shouldn't be punished by losing their job.

     This is the most unethical picture because it is portraying false information. Saddam an Bush did not debate, but the image makes it look like they did. Anybody who had picked up this article expecting a story on how they debated, would have been disappointed because the cover page was a false representation of what really happened. 

     This photograph is the least unethical because the use of photoshop didn't advertise or portray false information. In this picture, the pyramids were moved closer together so that the background would be fuller. This isn't bad because the editor didn't heavily alter or change an event that occurred.