As many of you have presumably read, 58-year-old Ki-Suk Han from Queens, NY was shoved onto the Grand Central Station subway tracks by an agitated, unidentified assailant on Tuesday afternoon. The New York Post published a photo taken by a freelance photographer moments before Han was struck by the oncoming subway train. To make matters worse, the photo made the front page and was accompanied by the headline DOOMED: Pushed on the subway track, this man is about to die.
There are many ethical debates to be had about this event: the mental health of the assailant, the fact that no one immediately near Han tried to save him at any point, and what has gotten the most press so far - that photographer R. Umar Abbasi took 49 photographs during the time that Han was still alive and struggling to get off the subway tracks.
In terms of questions raised about the suspect's mental health, the legislation for Kendra's Law will likely be further reinforced as a result of Han's death. Kendra's Law was enacted in 1999 after 32-year-old Kendra Webdale was pushed in front of an oncoming subway train in New York City. The law enables judges to require people with a certain level of mental disorder to regularly undergo psychiatric treatment. This idea of forcible patient commitment is meant to stop violent incidents such as the death of Ki-Suk Han before they have a chance to occur.
The fact that there were dozens of witnesses to Ki-Suk Han's death yet none who tried to help him is horrifying. Who knows how often this bystander effect occurs? When there are lots of people around an incident like this, most people assume someone else will step in and help, and by the time they realize no one is stepping up, it's too late. To be fair, though, I cannot say how I would act if I were placed in the same situation. Since I was not there I don't know if 20 seconds was enough for someone to run and pull Han up from the tracks, or if anyone there was strong enough to do that without endangering their own life. It's a tough situation to judge. But knowing how crowded a New York subway station would be at lunch hour on a Tuesday, it seems incredible that no efforts were made to save his life.
Unless you consider New York Post photographer R. Umar Abbasi. This is the ethical discussion that the press is really eating up right now. Abbasi took the photo of Han moments before his death that ended up making the front page of the New York Post. Details become skeptical here, so I can't confirm anything as truth, but I can write what Abbasi has said in interviews since yesterday afternoon.
In an interview with USA Today, Abbasi says he did all he could to save Han's life. He claims he was hundreds of feet away and wouldn't have made it in time without seriously threatening his own life. Abbasi said that he saw the lights of the oncoming train and his first reaction was to use his camera flash to alert the driver to stop the train. This is where I begin to wonder - was Abbasi being a journalist or a human being?
In journalism you are trained to detach yourself from situations so you can get the important information around you. In certain situations, though, it's very difficult to remain detached when human instinct takes priority and you put the camera or notepad down to help.
However, it can be argued that a journalist's role is a very important one to society, and that in moments like these journalism can take priority if it will inform the general public and perhaps propel awareness or even change. As my mentor Jock Lauterer says (and I quote him a lot on this), "Witnessing can be the strongest form of advocacy."
Several Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalists were asked to comment on the ethical dilemma with Abbasi's photos. Generally, they agreed that Abbasi should be given the benefit of the doubt. Their issue seemed to lie more so with the publication of the photo by the Post, particularly their choice to have it fill the entire front page. In the opinion of John Kaplan, a photojournalism professor at the University of Florida, the story is not a major news events, and did not warrant the need for such a display.
When we look past all the tangents, the real point is that an innocent person died. To me this was a reminder of the decision I will likely face in the future of when to be a journalist, and when to be a human being. It is a difficult decision to make in a matter of seconds, but maybe journalists should be better prepared to judge whether a photo is ever worth the cost of a human life.
