Â鶹Éç

Available for over a year

Good morning. When an Italian broadcaster showed leaked footage this week of a cable car crash that killed 14, there was outrage among viewers – a response that was similar to the shock expressed days earlier about TV pictures showing footballer Christian Eriksen collapsed during a match. The anger on both occasions was striking because there’s some evidence that we’re becoming desensitized to the most graphic images. Film-makers routinely include violent scenes in their movies. And there’s evidence that people have compassion fatigue when they’re constantly shown images of suffering by aid organisations. Yet despite that exposure, many people thought the scenes of the cable car accident and of Eriksen’s cardiac arrest went way too far. People’s responses to images are very much tied to their belief that individuals’ dignity is stripped away if there is no privacy during suffering, especially at the point of death. And the more the person shown is an individual – a famous footballer, say, or a named victim – the more they seem to us a real person with whom we can empathise. In the past things were very different. The crowds watching an execution, here during the Reformation, or someone being fed to the lions in ancient Rome was considered a form of entertainment. The person put to death was thought to deserve it. They were considered less than a person, so there was no empathy. But there are instances when images of suffering are considered acceptable even today. Think of the iconic image of the traumatized young girl, running down the street, napalmed during the Vietnam War, or prisoners in Auschwitz. People endure them because they play a role in reminding us of the capacity for humanity’s extreme cruelty and make people determined such events must never happen again. They are also a paradox: the people pictured enduring such terrible suffering and being dehumanized by others, are in a sense rehumanised by those seeing the pictures and who empathise with their plight. One of the strongest images in history of a terrible death is that of the crucifixion of Jesus. It’s an irony that Christianity, founded by a man who advocated peace, and who said blessed are the peacemakers, has violence at its heart. Christianity would not exist without the cross. To Christians, that cross represents Christ’s ultimate sacrifice, the giving of his life. But to others, images of Christ crucified – whether a wooden crucifix on a church wall or a painting by a great artist – can also resonate. It is Everyman on the cross – a victim of humanity’s capacity for the cruellest deeds but also an inspiration for compassion. Sometimes the most terrible and most repellent images should be seen.