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<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial>>> From the perspective of midevar sheqer tirchaq, the caption
should have<BR>>> read something like " ... (Secr. Clinton's image removed
from the photo.)"<BR>>> To mislead people into thinking this was the
actual scene (even if the<BR>>> scene was set up for the photo-up) is
halachically problematic, no?<BR><BR>> Why should it be? How is anyone
harmed by not seeing the whole set-up<BR>> photo? ...[--RZS]<BR><BR>I'm
talking about midevar sheqer tirchaq, and you are answering me<BR>in terms of
hezeq. Lying (leshaqeir) is assur. Misrepresenting the<BR>truth without an
outright lie (leshanos) is only mutar in specific<BR>circumstances:<BR><BR>--
<BR>Micha
Berger
<BR>micha@aishdas.org
<BR><BR><BR><BR></DIV></FONT></DIV>
<DIV></DIV>>>>></DIV>
<DIV>Niether "midvar sheker tirchak" nor any other halachic issur or hashkafic
problem attach to the alteration of photos that are printed in newspapers, with
the exception of photos that are /intended/ to mislead, e.g., printing a picture
of a yeshiva bochur who has been bloodied by Arabs with the caption, "Arab boy
beaten by Israeli police." </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Aside from such /intentional falsification/, no other type of alteration is
in any way problematic from a Torah point of view, since in this day and age
/everyone/ knows about photo-shopping, photo-cropping, changing the background
scenery, showing just one person, enlarged, cropped from a photo that originally
showed a group, etc etc etc. It is perfectly well understood by all
literate people that photographs in newspapers are altered in myriad ways every
day -- enlarged, lightened, darkened, faces blurred out to protect witnesses,
etc etc etc etc. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>In the case of the particular photo presently under discussion, it was
originally released purportedly as a photo of Important People in the Situation
Room, watching the take-down of Osama in real time. As subsequently
reported in the NY Times and many other newspapers, the SEAL invasion of the OBL
compound was /not/ seen in Washington in real time and the photo was itself,
therefore, a misrepresentation of what actually happened. "Mrs.Clinton has
said she does not recall what they were watching.... it falls<BR>short of
what photography, at its best, historically has been thought to do:
present the truth." (NY Times, see <A href="http://tinyurl.com/3r56z8n">http://tinyurl.com/3r56z8n</A>)<BR></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Of course in the computer age, "present the truth" is exactly what
photography no longer does, and even the NYT knows that ("historically" "at its
best"). To attack a tiny-circulation Jewish paper for doing what it
always does -- delete photos of women -- is completely disingenuous and has
nothing to do with halacha. Personally I find the policy of deleting
women distasteful, but this full-throated attack on one tiny Jewish
newspaper is much worse than distasteful -- it is reprehensible.
Especially when the alleged "chillul Hashem" is being perpetrated and
disseminated by Orthodox Jews themselves, who are blackening the name of
fellow Jews under the guise of disassociating themselves from the alleged
[non-existent] chillul Hashem.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Non-Jewish media only picked up and magnified the story after secular
Jewish media, and later Orthodox media, picked it up and made "much ado about
nothing." In this case, literally NOTHING: an unfilled space in a
photograph, which itself was a photograph of nothing. Just some people
looking at nobody remembers what. All the talk talk talk created a story
where there had been none, and it may be that the very discussion, especially
the negative discussion and condemnation, itself is a transgression of "lo
selech rachil be'amecha."</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
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<DIV><FONT lang=0 color=#0000ff size=2 face=Arial FAMILY="SANSSERIF" PTSIZE="10"><BR><B>--Toby Katz<BR>================</FONT><FONT lang=0 color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial FAMILY="SANSSERIF" PTSIZE="10"><BR></B><BR><BR><BR><BR>_____________________</FONT></DIV></FONT></BODY></HTML>