The New York Post recently published a picture taken in a subway. The picture was of a man who had been pushed onto the tracks. He was hit and killed moments after the picture was taken. Criticism has come against the photographer for not trying to save the man, and against The Post for publishing the picture.

Was it wrong for The Post to publish the picture? Or is it simply showing us an ugly reality that we don't want to see?

Was it wrong for the man to take the picture? Weigh in.

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/manhattan/nightmare_on_subway_tracks_GgvCtkeJj6cTeyxHns2VNP

instead of taking pictures he should have gone to pull him out as soon as he was pushed in. The paper states the culprit stood over his victim too, and no one helped.
Because the photographer was such an a hole the paper shouldnt have given his shot paper room, least of all front page.
Ridiculous.

I don't know what possessed that photographer to take a snapshot of a man in front of a train about to die and put it in a newspaper rather than trying to save his life. I mean, of all the things that could've been done, taking a screenshot of the guy's final seconds is definitely NOT the best option. I mean seriously? What the hell has America come to? And I don't think they should've put that in the newspaper at all, let alone on the front page. It almost seems as if they don't give a damn that he was going to die, as long as they had proof. I really don't understand people these days.

The photographer wasn't even the first person to see the man on the tracks. He just gets the criticism because he's the one with the picture. The fact is, the man was pushed onto the tracks and was hit by a subway shortly after. Subways move pretty quickly, and for the photographer to run all the way over to the man, help him up, and get both of them out in time just wouldn't have happened. Instead of having a case where one man was killed by a subway, we'd have a case with one man being killed and a dumbass trying to be a hero.

It's easy to criticize someone when we're not there. But the hatred and baseless judgment being passed on the photographer is disgusting.

I don't really have a problem with them publishing the picture. Would they have still ran this story if they didn't have a picture to go with it? It's impossible to say for sure but I bet they would have, maybe not on the front page but they would have. In my opinion there isn't much of a difference between giving the readers a mental image by describing the event and showing a visual image.

That's not to say I have no issues with this story at all. As everyone else said it would have been wiser for the photographer to try and rescue the man instead of trying to slow down the train. It's not like any type of signal he could possibly give the driver is going to slow down that much weight/momentum in time anyways. It may not have been possible for him to get to the man in time and was probably reacting very instinctually, not logically so I will give him the benefit of the doubt.

Where the real problem lies in this story is the tastelessness of it. A front page story of a man about to die titled "Pushed on the subway track, this man is about to die ... DOOMED". Really? I realize newspapers and media in general aren't always the most tasteful but this truly shows how low they can get just to try and sell more papers. I doubt they had gotten permission of the victims family to print the picture within the 12 hours between the incident and the article being posted. If that's not illegal it should be.

Everyone talks about the photographer but what about the man that pushed him. Even though the photographer should have saved the man. New York. A huge subway system and no one cares. The photographer says that he was going to save the man. But how? He can not take a pro photo while running. One great step for humanity!

soxfan849 :  I agree with you soxfan, and I was actually surprised no one else though the same thing.  I mean, there's no way the photographer was close enough to grab the man before the subway would have hit him.

Now, should he have taken the picture?   That I think is up for debate.  I'm not too keen on the fact that the photographer decided to snap a shot of a man about to die.  While it's true that there's no possible way he could have reached the guy, what would possess him to pull out his camera?  My thoughts are that he was trying to capitalize on a very unfortunate event.

I can hope, however, that his intentions were somehow decent (though I'm not sure what intention -could- be decent in such a situation.  Even if I was a hundred feet away, I think my own inclination would be to start running towards him... not pull out a camera.)

But I also agree with several people posting here.  What about the man that pushed him onto the rails?  What about everyone else in the subway?  There's not enough in the photo to tell if anyone was near, but I hope for the sake of human decency that no one was.  It'd make me feel a LITTLE better about society if that's the reason he didn't get the help he needed: because no one was around.

It's very sad that we live in a society which will just stand by and watch people be beat.... and then act like nothing happened.  I mean, there are some chilling videos there of men and women crying out for help in dire situations.... and of bystanders not even turning their heads. It's downright creepy and disheartening.

Singelli :

According to the photographer, he was trying to use the flash on his camera to get the conductor's attention. I don't know how true that is, or how possible it is for him to take a picture that was centered that well on accident, but it's his explanation.

soxfan849 : Yeah, I hadn't read through the whole article because I was at work and busy when I first glanced at the article.

I do agree with you though.  It seems a little unlikely that his photo would have been so perfectly shot, and so clear as well.  I don't know how he would have expected the train to stop in that short of a distance, either.  It's too bad we'll never know if the guy is trying to diffuse the verbal assaults, or if he was being honest.  It's quite possible that he just didn't know what else to do, and it's hard to think rationally when such a dire situation will be concluded in so short a time.

I don't want to sound like I'm ignoring the intended discussion, but "who cares?" Saying what should have been done is not going to change the past. What should be told is what shouldn't have been done; pushing a man onto the subway tracks. I hope they charge the suspect with murder, because that's what his actions lead to.

I probably would have tried to photograph the murderer instead of the victim, just to get evidence of the man. I know it ended up being unnecessary since the murderer confessed, but if I could not help the man in one way, I would try another way.

Though, the factor of shock can freeze people in place sometimes. It would not surprise me if I found myself just dumbstruck with mouth agape, or uselessly yelling. I would like to think I would try to rescue the man, even if it was just getting my hands out to pull him up, but fear could keep me from doing that.

We do not know how much time there was to react exactly, or what position the photographer was in when he suddenly snapped the picture. It's possible he just had the camera in his hands, perhaps fumbling around with it at the time when the poor man was pushed. Or he could have easily been the guy who saw a disaster coming so took the picture in hopes to publicize it. His excuse sounds really lame, though; I have a feeling he was too scared to help so tried to benefit from the situation. I do not think he was entirely prepared for it, but the mind does strange things when you panic.

As for if it was right of the newspaper to publish the picture? I think they could have put it away from the front page or something for respect of the family, but newspapers are dying and want to grab attention, and that picture certainly could grab attention. Otherwise, I think it was okay to have the picture.

AuraBlaze : Discussing what should have been done is a way of discussing what should be done in general; and, therefore, what should be done in the future.

Discussing the fact that the man shouldn't have been pushed on to the tracks isn't really a topic of discussion. By that, I mean that unless the man who was killed had previously threatened the life of the man who pushed (which he didn't), there's no justification for pushing him onto the tracks.

To answer your last point, the "pusher" has been arrested and, I believe, charged with murder.

Astynax27 : I would say it was wrong on both sides. I am a writer who has done work for magazines. I would never do something that I didn’t consider right in order to get something published. There’s a line you don’t cross etc. In regard to the photographer if I were in his shoes I would have dropped my camera and attempted to save this man. As far as the paper I am surprised that they would publish the picture. My heart goes out to the man and his family.

Better than other people goingonto the tracks to save him and end up trying to outrun the subway train.
...
I'm probably butchering the reference, being it's secondhand info, so don't mind me if you don't get it, Nya~.

Anyways, what purpose did the paper have? Did it share that guys story alone, or did it tell info about deaths based on falling on the tracks in general? If it's the first, that's pretty... Sad. The photographer/story writer should probably stick to stuff like Facebook if they wanna get their stories shared.

Also, I really, REALLY doubt using the flash on the camera will work at all. If anything, the driver probably would have thought he was being a nuisance and ignore him, Nya~.

As for the whole incident in general, meh. I wasn't there, so I can't feel too much pity for him, especially knowing elsewhere that more people are dying in worse ways. Even if I were there, in all honesty, I'd pretty much be in shock and not do anything either. Same with probably 99% of all the other people that are bashing the photographer or other people there for not doing anything.

If anything, I'd say that all you can do now is arrest the guy who pushed him onto the tracks, but that's about it, Nya~.

AuraBlaze : I absolutely agree that the man who pushed him should be charged with murder.  There's not a doubt in my mind, and if he isn't charged such, then something is seriously wrong with the world.  (But then again, we knew that, right?)

...He already confessed to murder.

The media has pictures of death and dying people all the time so this isn't that unusual. To the fact that people are crying that the person that took the picture should have been saving the man, none of us was there and how are we to know that the photographer was physically able to save the man? I don't think it was right to take a picture of this though. Feeding the more basic parts of the personality is disgusting.

The worst part of this isn't the picture being published or the article, it's the fact that on person pushed another into the path of the subway train.This callous disregard for a fellow human being is disgusting and appalling. I'm not a fan of the death penalty, it actually costs more money to do that than give someone a life sentence, but maybe it's time for an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth? Throw him in front of a train and let him know he will die soon.

Incredibly selfish on the photographer's and the newspaper's part.