Capture Australia – September-October 2019

capturemag.com.au

business censorship

[capture] sep_oct.19

The Hicks-Facebook saga is emblematic of the way we so often
perceive the issue of censorship as photographers: either a publishing
platform or a social media outlet abusing the trust of photographers and
putting into play their own more palatable version of the image that has
otherwise been put forth. But is this editorial form of censorship the most
malignant under the umbrella term? Australian photojournalist Matthew
Abbott is quick to draw attention to other forms of censorship at all
stages within the practice of journalism. Among his extensive assignment
work for The New York Times and other large media outlets, Abbott’s
work from the Manus Island detention centre resonated most loudly with
the audience of Australia. But as he details, the island itself provides for a
suite of examples in understanding just how much censorial adversity a
photojournalist is often faced with. “Censorship is multifaceted. It’s not
just about an editor deciding whether or not to run something because it’s
controversial,” says Abbott. “For me, most of the time when I come across

censorship it’s more to do with barriers that have been put in place for

photojournalists to be able to access sensitive topics.”

This was most abruptly illustrated to Abbott when a particular

incident unfolded before him while photographing detainees on Manus

in 2016. “We saw these two guys walking towards us just covered in

blood and kind of stumbling. They were walking toward a police station;

one guy came in and just collapsed unconscious. It was chaos and

nobody was sure if he was actually alive,” recounts Abbott. “So, I was

just photographing the scene and then all of a sudden people became

very aware of my presence and the camera. The police were trying to

block my line of view and to basically intimidate me into not

photographing. One of the photographs actually shows a policeman’s

hand over the lens.” Following the incident and facing increasing

hostility from the authorities, Abbott ejected his memory card from the

camera and left it in the safe hands of a detainee before being escorted

away for questioning. He was subsequently banned from entry to Papua

New Guinea. “Sure enough, I went to go back about two years later to

cover the same story and I was refused entry into the country. I was told

that I was on a blacklist and that I was refused because I had published

certain material. In my view, that decision was made by the Australian

Government, not Papua New Guinea, but I guess we’ll never know.”

But while Abbott recalls his experience on Manus Island as an

example of the nefarious nature of censorship in the face of bearing

witness, the 34-year-old recounts with equal rigour his time in South

Sudan where a need for self-censorship came about from quite literally a

life-or-death scenario. Reporting on ethnic conflict surrounding a

refugee camp of tens of thousands of people, Abbott says that the

publication of a single photograph could have been enough to warrant a

genocidal response from volatile government forces. “I got access to go

and photograph the rebels both inside and outside the camp. Inside,

some of these rebels had guns. Long story short, I was photographing

there for ten days and at the end of that the UN camp brought me in for

a meeting,” he recalls. “They turned to me and said that, basically, if I

publish photographs of guns inside the camp that I could be responsible

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