The report on sexual harassment in photojournalism published last week in the Columbia Journalism Review shows that not much has changed in the year since PDN reported several women photographers’ accounts of sexual harassment in newsrooms and at industry events. It’s also been eight months since Bill Frakes lost his appeal in a sexual harassment case, seven months since Patrick Witty left National Geographic following an external investigation into allegations he had sexual harassed several women, five months since photographers Daniel Sircar and Justin Cook wrote an open letter calling on photo industry organizations to establish clear codes of conduct and ban anyone who makes industry events unsafe, and four months since we reported Prime Collective had dropped Christian Rodriguez following numerous allegations about his conduct towards women. A lot more people are talking openly about sexual harassment, some alleged predators have been dropped from their agencies or lost their jobs, but the CJR piece also shows that photojournalism has been resistant to the systemic changes it needs.
