Commentary: Why pictures of the horrors in Ukraine can strengthen our political will
by Susie Linfield, Los Angeles Times
Apr 09, 2022
4 minutes
On Tuesday, in a dramatic and furious speech to the United Nations Security Council, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy presented graphic atrocity photographs from Bucha — including close-ups of dead children and clumps of corpses, some with their hands tied behind their backs. “The chamber fell silent,” the New York Times reported, and the photographs ricocheted around the world. Almost immediately, the European Commission proposed to cut off coal imports from Russia and President Joe Biden vowed additional sanctions.
The pictures, apparently, had done their job.
But images can’t make political decisions. Photographs can’t do our thinking for us, though
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