Visual Culture Blog

Leader of the opposition in Great Britain, Ed Miliband, at the Bethnal Green Academy 10 January 2012.
Photo by Stefan Rousseau, PA.

Frequent readers of this blog will know that I have turned my attention to the so-called photo op on a number of occasions. For instance, in my post ‘A Photo Op Gone Awry’, I wrote about the amazing moment caught on news cameras when a doctor angrily kicked the British Prime Minister David Cameron off his ward for failing to follow hospital procedures. While the photo op can be a potential disaster, it can, on the other hand, also be a golden opportunity for politicians wanting to improve their public image. Barack Obama famously bent over to allow a little boy to touch his hair as analyzed in my post ‘The President’s Haircut’. Unpredictable behaviour from children or ranting doctors – they are the unforeseen variables that can turn a photo op into a success or an utter failure.

Yet it is also the politicians themselves who can dramatically impact the potential success or failure of a photo op. Let me turn my attention to a more recent photo op to illustrate my point. In advance of an important speech on the economy, the leader of the opposition in Great Britain, Ed Miliband, visited the Bethnal Green Academy in East London on 10 January. Sitting at a table with young pupils, the majority of whom are from an ethnic minority, Miliband sought to portray himself as a careful and empathetic listener, in tune with the desires and anxieties of a younger generation.

Miliband’s position at the table is crucial. Sitting next to two black girls Miliband’s advisors wish to emphasize three important agendas: the Labour party supports young people, young people from ethnic minorities, and especially, young women from ethnic minorities. Miliband’s empathy with this marginalized future group of voters (one that might decide who becomes the next Prime Minister in 2015) is also explored on a visual level. Miliband’s attire is somewhat mirroring that of the pupils next to him, while his tie closely resembles the main colour of the school library in the background and the pamphlets on the table. This mirroring effect can also seen in the image as a whole as the left side of the image closely resembles the right side of the image with Miliband representing the central axis point.

While the girl on the right hand side of the image appears to listen intently to someone in the background, the girl on the left looks straight into the camera. Her facial expression and the slightest hint of a smile give the impression that she is aware of her own image, and possibly, that she also knows why she is placed next to the leader of the opposition. She exudes the type of awareness that is normally associated with image savvy celebrities.

In contrast to the girl’s self-awareness, Miliband appears spaced out as he neither seems to listen intently nor look at the camera. His eyes, wide open and not focusing on anything in particular, make Miliband look as if he is a pupil himself, lost in his own thoughts and struggling to hang on for attention. If this was a real classroom situation, one might imagine the teacher asking Miliband: ‘Ed, are you with us?’. The tragedy of the photo op is that Miliband looks like a child, even less mature and aware of his surroundings then the very children around him.

A small detail in the photograph that debunks this narrative is the cup of tea in front of Miliband. In spite of empathetically sitting next to young students, the cup of tea makes Miliband look undeservedly privileged. One British newspapers exploited this detail when it wrote in the caption of the photograph: ‘Not your cup of tea? Ed Miliband meets pupils at Bethnal Green Academy, in east London, ahead of a speech on the economy.’ (Metro) From an image campaigners point of view, what was likely a carefully planned photo op, turned into a complete disaster. Emerging dazed from the Bethnal Green Academy, Miliband would give a speech that was supposed to convince the British people of his economic prowess.

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AFP

It was, as usual, a carefully choreographed photo op: at an event hosted by LinkedIn, Barrack Obama promoted his $447 Billion jobs package that shall but Americans back to work. The current jobless rate of 9.1 percent is an extremely worrying figure that will likely define the upcoming elections. It therefore made sense to hold this town hall type of discussion with LinkedIn – an online tool for professional networking. Sitting next to Jeff Weiner, the charismatic and handsome CEO of LinkedIn, Obama sought to bathe in the glory of LinkedIn’s success story. Other visual markers reiterate this association: the LinkedIn logo is clearly on display throughout the room, the curtains represent the colour of the company and in the background are mainly LinkedIn employees.

Here, Obama appears to follow a pattern after visiting similar events hosted by Facebook and Twitter. The next year is election year and the Obama administration is carefully aligning itself with the major players of Silicon Valley. It was, after all, the power of the social network that helped Obama into power in the first place. If the social network can help Obama find a job, the underlining message of the photo op is that the social network can also help those that are currently still looking. It is a message filled with optimism and this most Obamaesque of words: hope.

On closer inspection however the main visual association with LinkedIn might come to haunt the Obama administration. It is true that LinkedIn is one of the great recent success stories of the boom in social media. In May 2011 LinkedIn was floated on the New York Stock Exchange which resulted in a market capitalization of currently $7.5 Billion. At the same time however, in the last quarter LinkedIn posted a net income of only $4.5 Million. In other words, LinkedIn’s capitalization does not reflect it’s current income, but rather, it reflects the market’s belief in future income. One of the main indices used to calculate the worthiness of a company’s stock is price-to-earnings ratio (P/E ratio) which, for most ‘traditional’ companies, hovers below or above 14. LinkedIn’s P/E ratio, on the other hand, is currently rated at 1100 either indicating an extremely high expectation in future growth or that the stock is subject to a speculative bubble. Obama’s association with LinkedIn is either based on extreme expectations, or, far worse, it is based on extreme speculation.

But there is another far more important reason why I believe the LinkedIn photo op was a rather ill fated event. Although LinkedIn claims to help those currently looking for a job, with just over 1.000 staff LinkedIn doesn’t actually employ many people themselves. This dilemma is better represented by comparing other companies with a similar market cap: US Steel ($3.35 Billion) employs 42.000, AMD ($4.42 Billion) employs 11.100 and Abercrombie & Fitch ($5.70 Billion) employs 9.000 full-timers whereas it also employs 76.000 part-timers. Obama’s association with LinkedIn is thus purely based on the superficial belief that indeed, LinkedIn creates job opportunities for those who subscribe to it’s services – some of which at a significant monthly cost for the user (I am yet to come across someone who actually got a job through LinkedIn).

A week ago the American Census Bureau published a shocking figure: 46.2 million Americans now live in absolute poverty. By far the worst statistics in the industrialized world, that figure represents nearly on in six Americans. Are these the people that sign up to LinkedIn in the hope of finding a job? Is it those people that have the internet connection that would even allow them to access LinkedIn in the first place? Are these the people that have the IT and media degrees that would make them potentially desirable in Silicon Valley? While these questions remain unanswered, the LinkedIn photo op represents an extremely risky strategy which ultimately hinges on LinkedIn’s continued success in the future. Similar to those investing in a vastly overvalued company, the President’s advisors will hope that LinkedIn’s stock prize has not quite yet reached a precipice.

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In the new TV show ‘Sarah Palin’s Alaska’, the former vice-presidential candidate is shown shooting a Caribou. The footage has caused a major backlash, lead by Aaron Sorkin, the creator of the TV show West Wing, arguing that Palin shot an animal ‘for political gain’. As Palin is expected to run for president in 2012, the counter question would be, how can it be anything other than for political gain?

The footage shows Palin and two men hiding in the Alaskan wilderness. After they spotted the Caribou, the men instruct Palin on how and when to shoot the animal. For a brief instance, the camera depicts a cloudy sky as the music intensifies. Clearly, the viewer is made to understand that this is a potentially threatening encounter with woman and nature. Palin misses the first shot. The volume of the music increases as the Caribou now appears to look straight at Palin. The intensity grows exponentially as there is a brief confusion of how to shoot the beast. And then, almost in the last possible instance, Palin lands the shot that would bring down the Caribou. One of the men congratulates either Palin, the Caribou, or both, with the jubilant words: ‘There you guy baby, there you go.’ Palin meanwhile, far more in control of her emotions then the men, whispers as if the potential threat is still lingering. After approaching the beast, one of the men asks ‘Is it dead?’, while Palin, after a brief assessment declares in a matter of fact voice ‘It’s dead!’. The music dramatically changes from Armageddon to a fun day out for the family.

So why would this TV footage be derided for being used ‘for political gain’. It depicts Sarah Palin as a strong woman, who, with the right men around her, can succeed in a male-dominated world. In a sense, the footage foreshadows Palin’s ambitions to run for President, while her running mate(s) were signified by the two men to her side. Palin often refers to looking a threat straight into the eye. Here, the visual encounter with the enemy is important (e.g. in the same way Palin can see Russia from her front porch, she can see a Caribou in the far distance). Although the mildly dangerous animal is about 100 meters away, the visual encounter with a potential threat marks an important aspect of the footage. The point is that, akin to a shifting signifier, the Caribou, in the mind of the viewer, can be replaced with any other threat to America’s national security.

Any number of presidential candidates made use of such an ideologically loaded image in American popular culture. Even the democrat John Kerry, while running for President in 2004, was eager to have himself photographed goose hunting in Ohio. The following day, on October 22nd 2004, Dick Cheney launched an impassioned attack on Kerry, deriding him for wearing a camouflaged jacket that looked brand new. ‘Which did make me wonder how regularly he does go goose hunting,’ Dick Cheney said then. After Cheney accidentally shot a fellow hunter in February 2006, such criticism would never be uttered again.

Sarah Palin shoots a Caribou for political gain. But the shooting itself is politically insignificant. It is only once a visual representation of the shooting is disseminated in mass media and culture, that this representation reaches it’s full effectiveness. As the storm clouds are gathering over the Alaskan wilderness again, Sarah Palin sets her eyes on the next target.

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