GET OFF YOUR SOAP BOX!

Support the Campaign for the freedom to take Photos!

A couple of days ago I dusted down my Fuji s9600 and invested in a wide angle conversion lens. I don’t use the camera much but thought I must start using it more this year and over the last few days, with crisp winter sunshine, I have taken some nice photos. A few of the dog and a few of the lovely coastline where I live. Mustn’t just rely on the camera’s Auto setting and start tinkering with shutter speed and aperture. I just wish the dog would stay still!

Then I see that yesterday there was a protest in Trafalgar Square, by a few thousand amateur and professional photographers,  protesting about how you can no longer freely take photographs in Britain without the risk of being shot or sent to Camp Delta at Guantanamo Bay for 6 years. That the Police are invoking Section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000 with an over zealous approach.

There are probably a few locations or buildings where cameras are not welcome but I don’t think you should run the risk of being tortured by water boarding just for taking a photo of a fish and chip shop or a bus station.

Seriously though, this anti-terror legislation, or rather,  the way the Police are implementing it, is effectively a clamped down on your rights. Like something born out of Nazi Germany.

There is a couple of websites campaigns against this autocratic behaviour. There is wwwPhotographerNotaTerrorist.org which also has a Facebook campaign page , with nearly 13,000 members. They have produced a very handy Bust card, which photographers can refer to when stopped by the Police.

Also, The British Journal of Photography has started a visual campaign called ‘not a crime’, with the website www.not-a-crime.co.uk

So please support this campaign. Photography is a great hobby for many and you should have the freedom to twiddle with your aperture as much as you like, where you like. For me, I don’t know what to photograph anymore. I don’t want to get Tasered for zooming in too close on the local library.

Instead I will take up reading, become more intellectual. ‘Mein Kampf’ for starters?

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 24th, 2010 at 12:13 pm and is filed under Politics, Society. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.