“on Behalf of Others” Argumentative Essay

764 Words4 Pages
“It seems to me curious, not to say obscene and thoroughly terrifying, that it could occur to an association of human beings drawn together through need and chance and for profit into a company, an organ of journalism, to pry intimately into the lives of an undefended and appallingly damaged group of human beings, an ignorant and helpless rural family, for the purpose of parading the nakedness, disadvantage and humiliation of these lives before another group of human beings.” I agree to the position taken in Agee’s quote for it is polite to respect other people who have been interviewed and shouldn’t be fully exposed. Documentarians should constantly make safer and better choices about what to highlight and what to deflect. Agee’s quote explains how people’s lives shouldn’t be fully exposed. In Lisa Ling’s video about the use of methadone, she has interviewed several people who have used methadone and even people who are still using methadone and are addicted to the drug. She has also showed people who are and were mentally disturbed by the drug itself. At one point it is helpful to spread the awareness of methadone and how it can cause a major and drastic change in your life. However, in my point of view, even though the video does help spread awareness in one way, the way how the people who are getting interviewed disturbs me. The people are fully exposed to the camera to the public, which is not respecting their own private lives. It is clearly difficult when people try to pry open your life and you have to share it publicly which does cause disturbance. People have private situations and difficulties that may be included and they may not want them to be exposed. The people who are being interviewed may feel uncomfortable or otherwise “naked” by exposing his/her life out to public and be seen publicly. In my own reporting work, I wouldn’t expose the people who
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