Originally Posted by
cyrus
Malls often restrict photography for fear of crooks casing the joint (or so they say) but I suppose a lot of the attitude towards photographersdepends on the culture of the area where you're shooting and not just the technicalities of the law. Travel photographers, take note!
Interestingly I ran into this exact problem in Iran of all places once when I started shooting snapshots inside a large mall in Tehran which sells computers and electronics - only second time I ever ran into any problems anywhere there (the bazaar is of course the grand-daddy of the modern shopping mall, but this wasn't a bazaar which is traditionally considered to be a public place - this was an American-style mall complete with muzak and marble fern plant holders.)
When the security guard told me to turn over my film I had a knee-jerk reaction of an American and firmly said heck no and demanded to see the police. He was sort of shocked and didn't know how to respond. I noticed that carefully and decided to press my advantage. We sat around arguing in his office until another more senior security guard came along and said that the police had no jurisdiction over private property such as the mall so he wasn't going to involve the police, but I retorted that there was no sign prohibiting photography, that film was my personal property and the mall had no jurisdiction over it and I wanted to file a police report for the attempted theft of my film. We went back and forth until the guards agreed to let me go if I signed a statement accepting responsibility in case the place was ever robbed. It was sort of naive and funny, since I was leaving the country in a couple of days anyway but I decided to continue the resistance just for fun. I indignantly refused on the grounds that if the place was ever robbed, I'd be responsible even if the robbers had never seen my photos. I didnt really care about the film but the issue had become an interesting cross-cultural communication experiment for me. They obviously didn't want to tanlge with the cops and instead wanted a face-saving way out and were looking for a workable compromise, or else they wouldn't have offered to accept a nonsensical note written by me taking responsibity for any potential robbery. This is a culture in which compromise is expected, and soothing ill-feelings is considered to be more important that defining a winner who is "right" and a loser who is "wong". Blatant in-your-face refusal to compromise - and worse, threats of calling the cops! - is considered to be a an indication that you've really offended someone quite seriously. So my attitude threw them off. They could also tell that I was visting from abroad, and this is also a culture where hospitality to guests is taken quite seriously. So, feigning disgust I turned over a roll of unused film that I had in my pocket and indigantly stormed out. Culturally, that was a serious rebuke to them. And as I expected, just as I got out the door, I heard my name called and the younger security guard ran up to me and quietly slipped the film roll back into my hands. That was that. By backing down and giving him the film, I had allowed the security guard to prove himself to the store owners who were probably genuinely concerned about burglary. In return, he had made amends for being "rude" to me by quitely and apologetically giving back the film - so all was well, and everyone wins even though the "rules" of the mall weren't technically enforced.
Anyway, the more interesting question in the US is to what extent can this private/public distinction go on. There was a time when the cultural/economic center of a city was the town square and other public property. If you wanted to express yourself, that's where you went to speak and demonstrate and pass out flyers and take photos etc. Now, the local shopping mall is the communal center - a private area, dedicated and carefully climate controlled for one thing: selling you a lot of crap made by large corporations - and that's all. Is that what the town square has been reduced to?
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