My first couple of websites, extremely basic affairs which I wrote back in about 1996 or ’97, using SimpleText or PageSpinner had the moniker of PhotoTerrorism.
This was, of course, before 9/11 and the threat of real terrorism in this country and at the time was just a kind of tongue-in-cheek identity that I thought described a small part of what was my photography ‘style.
There was nothing I liked better than to, with a reporter, go knocking on the door of some politico being charged with corruption or solicitation and banging off a few frames of the palms of their hands as they slammed the door in our faces or to push a wide angle lens up in the face of the handcuffed perp as he/she was led from the police car to the courthouse.
I kept the name PhotoTerrorism for a long time until I decided to register the domain. Much to my dismay, somebody had beaten me to it and worse, there was nothing of any real value there.
Disappointed, I just abandoned the whole idea of associating myself with that name and by then, I was out of the photo stalker business anyway.
But just last night, I temporarily but gently revisited the style and I probably don’t even know how close I came to being arrested for it.
It was the 18th birthday celebration of my niece Chelsea and 15 of us, geezers and teens, gathered at Buca di Beppo at Universal City Walk.
A lovely time was had by all and a fair amount of chianti was consumed by most, including myself.
Well, OK, I had too much chianti and occasionally when I have too much of a given alcoholic beverage, I start having too much fun, sometimes at the expense of those unlucky enough to be accompanying me. Linda will attest to this as she was the one who dealt with the bulk of my self-centeredness last night.
Having said that, I must state that I was nowhere near belligerent or obnoxious. I was not stumbling around annoying people, except maybe Linda.
After dinner we all strolled through City Walk and at one point most of us stopped near a store where some members of the party decided to buy socks.
So I sat down and began taking photographs of the crowds walking past. I was simply slowing the shutter down to expose for the abundance of neon and florescent and popping a little flash as people went by. Not a single person gave even a sideways glance as I did this for approximately 15 minutes. I took about 10-15 images this way then moved over to where Linda and her sister Susan were sitting and started photographing them.
Just then a security guard in a white, pleated shirt, mounty hat and utility belt approached and started interrogating me as to why I was taking photos.
“I’m taking photos because I like to take photos, why would you ask?” I replied, trying to tamp down the outrage that was immediately boiling up, but still let just the right amount of it out so as to sound confident and knowledgeable about what my rights were but not provoke this want-to-be law enforcement person.
“Are these folks members of your family sir?”
“Why yes they are, why would you ask?” I said with a touch more acrimony.
“Excuse me miss but is this person taking pictures related to you?” he asks Linda and Susan.
“Yes he is!” they both replied, voices charged with their own indignation.
It was about this time that I noticed that this officer for rent was not alone.
“What is the problem and why do you think it necessary to come over here and hassle me about taking pictures with no less than one, two, three, four, five, six SEVEN security guards?!”
I pointed to each one as I counted them speaking loud enough for passersby to hear.
I was already seeing myself being carted off with two guards holding each one of my limbs while I screamed, “I’m not resisting arrest, I’M NOT RESISTING ARREST!”
“We did not know the nature of the call sir” the little man with the utility belt replied.
“Oh please! I can not imagine how that radio transmission must have sounded!”
I was getting pissed and I was about to mock their lack of having anything more meaningful to do with their lives when it kind of hit me.
Having worked as a press photographer for 18 years I know what my, and anybody else’s, rights are in this situation. I’m basically on private property and these folks, under educated and overzealous as they may be, are acting as the agent of the property owner.
They can tell me that I can not take photos here if they wish, as absurd as that is being that this is a tourist attraction and there are hundreds of other people snapping away with the Canon digital ELFs and Kodak Easyshares.
Photography at CityWalk is OK unless you do it in such as way as it looks like you’re a professional and you have not acquired the requisite clearances from the PR department previously.
I decided that I really didn’t want to spend the night in jail and then have to deal with the repercussions and expense of it all later so I looked for a way to diffuse the situation and just walk away. Just then the magnificent 7 were joined by an armed L.A. Sheriff Deputy so we all did just that. We walked away.
I learned later that as we did, these dilweeds were actually high-fiving each other and saying things like, “Yeah, you better walk away!” like a bunch of street thugs having just forced a weaker foe to back down from an alley fight. This of course only confirms the level of incompetence of the “professional” security personnel employed by Universal.
It may very well be that the over-confidence won by the job-well-done of ridding City Walk of another photo nuisance, thereby rendering the place safe for consuming again, combined with the muddled ineptitude of the gang, that led to arrest later of another infidel.
Susan came into the micro brewery where we were later to tell us that the same crew had just taken an insurgent to the ground who continually screamed, “What did I do? Help me! What did I do?”
I could go on and on about how I think CityWalk is actually an oppressive police state run by former members of the Stasi and that I will never set foot there again but that would be boring.
This afternoon I think I may have discovered the reason that all of this got started. Looking at the images I had taken during that fateful 15 minutes I found the above.
This pint-sized vision of pseudo authority was right in the middle of the hopeless team with no future wearing the worst scowl I have ever seen on a human being.
I believe it was her who, after having a small amount of strobe light exposed on her lovely countenance, went running for reinforcements to harass and hopefully arrest the phototerrorist.