While we haven't seen many cases of adulteration of images
 in the international press, twisting captions has become in vogue—
specially in Brazilian newspapers. There are tens of cases in which
the editor introduces non-mentioned subjective ingredients in the
original caption, which aren't evident by the pictured situation.

Alberto Dines

From the Aurélio dictionary, here are the definitions for "cascata" in Portuguese:

1. Small waterfall
2. Pop. - Old and wrinkled woman.
3. Braz. Slang - lie
4. Braz. Slang - baloney, "hot air"
5. Braz. Journ.-  Inconsistent, rhetorical, non-factual, generally long story

The Anglo-American coalition has made 90 percent of all the mistakes it could have made: from the moral to the political, from the strategic to the tactic, from the historical to the propagandistic. Although the military campaign seems to be victorious as it stands, it's not hard to pinpoint its critical points and clamorous mistakes. And, above all, to imagine its future difficulties, some of which are insurmountable.

Therefore, with a minimum of theoretical knowledge, a bit of journalistic expertise and some doses of maturity, one can easily fill entire pages of well-founded and consistent analysis against this military insanity. What cannot be done is to take advantage of the generalized opposition to the war and build a journalistic "everything-goes". Like all others, it will eventually be unveiled. At some point, it will end up compromising the world consensus against the conflict. At some point, this state of exception will likely become the rule.

The old expedient of "cascata" is being legitimized by a holy indignation. The marketing of sacred wrath has blended with personal marketing, both tooled by folly and oversimplification. The member of the Brazilian Academy of Letters cum journalist of page 2 of Folha de S. Paulo, who was nudged in this forum and is now sorry, now recognizes that one can't mix Bush with American cultural contributions (Sunday, April 6^th).

The montage built a few days ago by the Los Angeles Times photographer is an example of an increasing and worrisome wave of rascality. The photographic "cascata" was caught by the paper's publishers and its author was immediately punished. The author admitted the breach and explained that his idea was to enlarge the dramatic effect of the situation. Plus, with editors constantly stuck in long meetings or lunches, who is going to take the trouble to denounce the prevaricating co-worker?

The montage or rearrangement of photos was not invented in this war. The two most famous ones happened during the Second World War, but were harmless. The first is related to the famous scene of the Marines raising the American flag in the island of Iwo Jima, in the Pacific. All indications are that the photographer (now dead) improved the dramatic composition, aided by the soldiers. There was no falsifying, the flag was in fact being hoisted up in the recently re-conquered island, but maybe in a pose of less impact.

The second montage was made by the Soviet propaganda machine when it put the Russian flag in the hands of a soldier on top of the Reichstag, in Berlin, right before the German capitulation, in May 1945. It was not news: the Russians have always possessed an enviable know-how in putting or removing characters from official photographs and thus rewrite contemporary history at the whim of the Kremlin's moves.

3The death of civilians in this war—the so-called collateral effects—doesn't need to be invented, magnified or dramatized by ambitious and irresponsible photographers. There are no intelligent bombs or "clean" wars. The Iraqi population is paying a very high price for the insanity of Saddam Hussein. The violent and terrifying picture doesn't need to be manipulated; the numbers are available and can be documented. Good journalism can only help good causes. Bad journalism can only harm them.

Indomitable, unbeatable

While so far we haven't seen many cases of adulteration of images in the international press, twisting captions has become in vogue—specially in Brazilian newspapers. There are tens of cases in which the on-call editor introduces non-mentioned subjective ingredients in the original caption which aren't even made evident by the pictured situation. Due to lack of knowledge of the English language (used in all captions sent by international agencies and built into the photos) or maybe the need to complete the empty space or a mere inclination for dramatizing—for all this and more, "supplements" are inserted, which end up providing unwary readers with a different interpretation of the actual scene. Some cases follow:

** On the front page of Jornal do Brasil on Monday (3/31), an armed U.S. soldier, his back to the camera, and beside him, crouched and facing the camera, a civilian. Caption: "Iraqi man is subdued by a coalition soldier… after offending him". Where is the proof that the Iraqi civilian disrespected the soldier? Pure imposition.

** In Folha, same day, also on the front page, children sitting down at the door of a house, facing an armed U.S. soldier: "Iraqi children are removed from their houses by U.S. Marines…" Sat down or squatted (accompanied by two women), they look at the photographer beside the soldier. There is no indication that the children were being removed. Pure rhetoric.

** In O Globo, Saturday, 3/29, front page, huge photo of an Iraqi woman with two children (one on her lap), with columns of smoke in the background and, on the foreground, a coalition armored vehicle: "Mothers with children flee the city of Basra… where violent confrontations have been happening: the British accuse Iraqi paramilitary groups of shooting civilians". There is no indication whatsoever of the presence of Iraqi military or paramilitary personnel intimidating the small family. The presence of the armored vehicle pointing in the direction contrary to the escape route denies the possibility that the woman and children had been the target of Iraqi fire. Pure inference.

** In Estado de S. Paulo, Friday (4/4), front page: a strong smoke column raises from a building in flames: "Fire and smoke in Bagdah: Iraqis burn fuel to impair visibility for enemy pilots". There is a lot of smoke coming from other buildings, but the darkness is certainly due to the time when the photo was taken. There are lights on in neighboring buildings and all indications are that it happened at dawn. There are no deposits of fuel in a large urban center and the fire in the wells occurred in the southern region of Basra. Pure imagination.

If journalism instructors in our `diploma factories' were real professionals, they would have serious topics to suggest to their students for their final papers. The captioning of war photos is one of them.

The accusation by Folha's special envoy Sérgio Dávila, published on Sunday (4/6, page A25) deserves a special reflection. Title: "Bagdah, the forbidden city". Subtitle: "The result of the control of information and numerous denials is that few people really know what is happening in the Iraqi capital". Well, it is known that the reporter received instructions to leave Bagdah a few days ago and is now in Aman, the Jordanian capital, from where he dispatched the story.

Questions arising from the seriousness of this accusation: why didn't the paper publish it before? If the reporter was in Bagdah for many days, why didn't he mention the iron-clad system of censorship of Saddam's regime while he was there? Didn't want to lose his source, as alleged by Peter Arnett? Afraid of reprisals? Okay: he could have said so in the story, then—he is safe in Aman. Things of this relevance cannot remain implied as "innuendo" (a Latin expression meaning insinuation, used in the Yankee journalistic jargon). And for what reason didn't the newspaper highlight the sensational accusation on its front page? Would it be too anti-Saddam and thus politically incorrect?

Folha decided, instead, to highlight an interview with a "bomb-man" photographed in Aman, with no hood or any other disguise. Until the man blows himself up (as he promised to do), the newspaper remains a nominee for the Peter Arnett Award for International "cascata".

And since we have mentioned the New-Zealander journalist, we should mention the title of the story Isto É used to greet him: "Indomitable". You can't discuss good taste, of course—specially when you consider that the magazine calls itself "independent". But the adjective seems to be slightly displaced when we know that, after acknowledging that he had done a "stupid" thing, Arnett picked up three fat contracts to remain in the same line of work. The king of "cascata" visited Rio once and stated that the journalism school who invited him was better than American journalism schools. Unbeatable.

Alberto Dines, the author, is a journalist, founder and researcher at LABJOR—Laboratório de Estudos Avançados em Jornalismo (Laboratory for Advanced Studies in Journalism) at UNICAMP (University of Campinas) and editor of the Observatório da Imprensa. He also writes a column on cultural issues for the Rio daily Jornal do Brasil. You can reach him by email at obsimp@ig.com.br 

Translated by Tereza Braga, email: tbragaling@cs.com 

This article was originally published in Observatório da Imprensa - www.observatoriodaimprensa.com.br  

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