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There is something about heavy handed crap policing.......... You can see where these no government types are coming from........ Crap policing....... It certainly makes me hate Virginia ...... Mind you Louisiana too has it fair share of crap policing....... I seem to remember most of them had run away when the going got tough in New Orleans after Katrina .......... Yeah most had left town when me and Matt were there in the Katrina aftermath ....... but today there are a whole ton of them to enforce the no photography of the oil spill ........ or anything oil related. Yeah never mind protect and serve during an emergency lets make sure no one gets a photo on an ordinary day...... hey...... thats proper crap policing for you.
Im not sure how anyone can even pretend to justify new laws that make it illegal for press people to approach the oil spill or the stuff deployed to supposedly protect the shoreline.
Apparently press people can now be fined $40,000-00 for going with in 65ft of an oil boom on the water ....... and their news organization fined $250,000-00........... Clearly this is to suppress information and truthful reporting........ I guess you can see why BP or other oil companies might want those powers...... maybe? ........... but Im not sure why the authorities and the police have gone down this route.......... unless they too want to suppress the truth ?...... surely not in the land of the free on Independence day ????? :-/ :-)
Anyway today I was thinking of photographing some kind of mega oil installation belonging to Conoco that is pumping smoke/gas/steam into the atmosphere....... it looks vaguely dramatic....... but the drama of the view is as nothing to the drama created by this awful woman Sheriff who immediately pounces on me...... makes me stand against my car with my hands out and feet spread....... but she never checks me for weapons (she knows I have none cos she knows Im a press guy) ...... the leaning on the car thing is just for ritual humiliation purposes...... i offer to show Press credentials and to let her look in the trunk to see all the camera gear....... but she is not interested she just wants to file a report that has my driving license number and car number on it as if i really am suspected of terrorism....... when even she full well knows what she is pretending is just a joke.
Any proof that I really am a professional photographer working with Press outlets would just spoil her pretense....... so she doesn't actually want to look in the car or at other ID....... yeah this is crap policing........ so it went on for ever...... as crap policing does.......... so in the end I end up leaning on the car with my hands in my pockets so she is then going for her gun....... yeah....... now we are talking way officious....... and way way crap......... dangerously crap policing.........
I was so bored and outraged by all this crap....... I felt like running off...... I saw an alligator yesterday......... someone was telling me if it comes out the water it can't catch you if you zig zag........ I'm sure the same applies to all these overweight cops that never leave their patrol cars ........ if you zig zag I bet they couldn't even shoot you never mind run after you........... :-))
So I ask about the what the law is that prevents me from taking a photo of pollution being released into the sky from a Chimney Stack. And how I am supposed to know about it........ if there are no signs........ after all you can only be done for trespassing on land where the 'No Trespassing' signs are clearly displayed......... you might think that if you were being detained for thinking of taking a photograph........ well the 'No Photography' signs might have to be displayed or at least the Sheriff detaining you would be able to say something more eloquent than its illegal "Because I say so"...... and.......... "If you ask me about what law you are being detained under again you will be fixing to go to jail and will be questioned by the FBI"
So now she assures me she has placed me on some FBI suspect list and that I had been reported to Homeland Security .......... Ah yes......... crap....... mighty crap policing.......
Big fat crap policing.
Cheers Jez XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
PS......... The writer on my story has just sent me this link headed 'you are not alone' : .......... http://fieldnotes.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2010/07/04/4611161-photographer-detained-by-police-bp-employee-near-refinery
PPS........ Here is a good CNN link sent to me by Harv........... http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/watch?v=TyUjgRfOdDg&feature=related
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.... The photography and slightly mad life of reportage artist Jez Coulson ....