Osama Bin Laden Death Photos: Why Death Photos Tempt Us – Speakeasy – WSJ

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by

Trent
in ,

Why Death Photos Matter

Osama bin Laden was killed a few days ago, and today the White House announced it will not release an image of his corpse. A look at the impact of other famous death images–and what they say about us.

via WSJ: http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2011/05/04/why-we-want-to-look-death-in-the-face/

It is easy and convenient to dismiss our desire to record and to see as primitive. The outrage over the Kill Team photographs is perfectly understandable, but we need to understand a few things.