Obama’s Orwellian Image Control — NY Times, Santiago Lyon

THE Internet has been abuzz over the spectacle of President Obama and the prime ministers of Britain and Denmark snapping a photo of themselves — a “selfie,” to use the mot du jour — with a smartphone at the memorial service for Nelson Mandela in South Africa on Tuesday.

Leaving aside whether it was appropriate, the moment captured the democratization of image making that is a hallmark of our gadget-filled, technologically rich era.

Manifestly undemocratic, in contrast, is the way Mr. Obama’s administration — in hypocritical defiance of the principles of openness and transparency he campaigned on — has systematically tried to bypass the media by releasing a sanitized visual record of his activities through official photographs and videos, at the expense of independent journalistic access.

The White House-based press corps was prohibited from photographing Mr. Obama on his first day at work in January 2009. Instead, a set of carefully vetted images was released. Since then the press has been allowed to photograph him alone in the Oval Office only twice: in 2009 and in 2010, both times when he was speaking on the phone. Pictures of him at work with his staff in the Oval Office — activities to which previous administrations routinely granted access — have never been allowed. […]

Allowing media access and providing official photos are not mutually exclusive. News outlets can choose (as The Times has occasionally done) to use an official, or handout, photo when its news value is compelling and the photo is taken in a place logically off limits to journalists, like the private residential quarters of the White House. But The Associated Press rejects a vast majority of White House handouts because they show newsworthy activities of public significance, in locations where we strongly believe journalists should have access.

Until the White House revisits its draconian restrictions on photojournalists’ access to the president, information-savvy citizens, too, would be wise to treat those handout photos for what they are: propaganda.

Santiago Lyon, a longtime photojournalist, is vice president and director of photography at The Associated Press.