How are the police to distinguish between legitimate photographers taking pictures in public and terrorists-in-waiting conducting nefarious schemes? In Long Beach, cops’ duties now include determining what is art, and detaining picture-takers whose photos have “no apparent aesthetic value”. So don’t take an ugly photo like the one at right, unless you want to be carted off as a terror suspect. Via Techdirt:
Apparently the police in Long Beach, California, have a policy that says if a police officer determines that a photographer is taking photos of something with “no apparent esthetic value,” they can detain them. This revelation came after photographer Sander Roscoe Wolff was taking the photo.
The police officer somehow determined that there couldn’t be esthetic value there, and thus, the photographer had to be detained and checked out. The police are defending this policy, saying that while officers don’t have any specific training in what qualifies as “apparent esthetic value,” they will stop anyone photographing things they don’t consider to be something a “regular tourist” would photograph. I actually have to go down to Long Beach next month for a speaking engagement, and I’m now tempted to take a bunch of photographs that have “no apparent esthetic value.”
