Michelle Malkin » The Atlantic should have Googled Jill Greenberg before hiring her

The Atlantic should have Googled Jill Greenberg before hiring her

By Michelle Malkin • September 14, 2008 11:03 PM

Scroll for updates…Atlantic to apologize to McCain for Greenberg…will not pay for photos, considering lawsuit…

I don’t feel sorry for The Atlantic magazine.

They are quite upset after discovering that Jill Greenberg, the left-wing photographer they hired to take photos of John McCain, is a deranged lunatic who manipulated pictures of the candidate to put him in a bad light — and then posted hateful photoshops of the images on her personal website and gloated about it to the Photo District News website.

Sample of her unhinged defacing of McCain’s pics, which looks like something straight out of a Democratic Underground thread:

Atlantic writer Jeffrey Goldberg, whose cover story was tainted by Greenberg’s work, writes: “Greenberg doctored photographs of McCain she took during her Atlantic-arranged shoot, which took place last month in Las Vegas. She has posted these doctored photographs on her website, which you can go find yourself, if you must. Suffice it to say that her ‘art’ is juvenile, and on occasion repulsive. This is not the issue, of course; the issue is that she betrayed this magazine, and disgraced her profession.”

Jill Greenberg disgraced her profession well before The Atlantic hired her.

A simple Google search would have turned up my post and posts by many professional photographers disgusted by what she did in 2004 and put on exhibit in 2006. This woman deliberately terrorized children, stripped them, ordered parents to “step out of the studio for a couple minutes” in concerted attempts to make children cry who were not cooperating, and then captioned the photos of the children with anti-Bush slogans.

Let me refresh your memories:

This is unbelievably sick. A left-wing photographer, Jill Greenberg, deliberately makes toddlers cry and turns the pictures into a Los Angeles art exhibit called “End Times” to indulge her Bush Derangement Syndrome. She slaps titles like “Grand Old Party,” “Four More Years,” and “Apocalypse Now” onto photos of the poor children she manipulated and goaded.

The Guardian covers the exhibit here with links to the children’s photos and reports how Greenberg deliberately provoked the children to tears:

When photographer Jill Greenberg decided to take a lollipop away from a small child, she had a broader purpose in mind.

“The first little boy I shot, Liam, suddenly became hysterically upset,” the Los Angeles-based photographer said. “It reminded me of helplessness and anger I feel about our current political and social situation.”

As the 27 two- and three-year-olds featured in her exhibition, End Times, cried and screamed, demanding the return of the lollipop given to them just moments before, Greenberg snapped away.

Someone at YouTube posted the gallery:

PopPhoto magazine published an interview with Greenberg, who used her own daughter in the anti-Bush exhibit as well, and speaks of the merits of children vs. monkeys as photo subjects:

When Jill Greenberg conceived the idea of photographing crying children back in 2004, she didn’t anticipate the attention the project would bring to her fledgling art career, or the furor it would raise. Greenberg, who lives in Los Angeles with her husband and two children, is already known as one of the country’s most success commercial photographers, with work for ad clients like Microsoft, Kraft, and Procter & Gamble and magazines like New York and Time. She has emerged as a potent force in fine art with a series of acutely lit portraits of monkeys and apes, which in turn led to her work with children.

Your images have certainly caused an uproar. What do you say to people who call you a child abuser?

I think they’re insane…Maybe getting kids to cry isn’t the nicest thing to do, but I’m not causing anyone permanent psychological damage.

How many kids did you shoot altogether?

Around 35. Some were the children of friends, plus my own daughter; others came from the Ford or Jet Set model agencies. Kid models aren’t very expensive—not as expensive as monkeys, for example.

The lighting is very dramatic. How did you accomplish that?

It’s the same lighting I used for my portraits of monkeys, and I’ve been using it for some recent magazine cover portraits…

Greenberg talks about the larger purpose of her “work:”

I saw this little girl who’d come to a party with her mom, and she was beautiful, so I thought it might be interesting to photograph her. When they came to my studio, the mother brought along her toddler son, and I decided to shoot him too. We took off his shirt because it was dirty. He started crying on his own, and I shot that, and when I got the contact sheets back I thought, “This could go with a caption, ‘Four More Years,’” like he was appalled at George Bush’s reelection…

…That was one of the things that interested me about the project—the strength and beauty of the images as images. I also thought they made a kind of political statement about the current state of anxiety a lot of people are in about the future of the country. Sometimes I just feel like crying about the way things are going.

Oh, and that’s not all. Greenberg and her husband went on to viciously attack and harass one of the photographers who criticized her tactics.

The woman is off her meds. Her website is named “The Manipulator” – and the entry page features one of the sick photos of the children she terrorized for her anti-Bush exhibit.

The child abuse-for-art controversy made international headlines.

Greenberg’s by-any-means-necessary anti-Bush zealotry was infamous in her industry.

Who recommended her to The Atlantic? Who vetted her?

The editors purport to be shocked and disgusted.

This is the same magazine that pays the salary of that cretin demanding Trig Palin’s birth records.

This is the same magazine that captioned a photo of McCain “McCainloser.jpg” just five months ago.

And now they say they were “blindsided?”

“We stand by the picture we are running on our cover,” said Atlantic editor James Bennet. “We feel it’s a respectful portrait. We hope we’ll be judged by that picture.”

But Bennet was appalled by Greenberg saying she tried to portray McCain in an unflattering way.

“We feel totally blind-sided,” he said. “Her behavior is outrageous. Incredibly unprofessional.”

Blindsided…or just blind?

***

Update: The Atlantic’s editor James Bennet says he’ll apologize to McCain for the Greenberg fiasco.

Scott Johnson at Power Line points out that The Atlantic has much more to apologize for than Greenberg:

Substitute the word “hysterical” for the word “indecent” and Goldberg’s comment applies in spades to Andrew Sullivan, who has become the Atlantic’s marquee writer online. When I recently asked one of Sullivan’s colleagues at the Atlantic why it abides Sullivan’s disgrace of the magazine, he simply referred to the traffic Sullivan generates for the Atlantic online.

Sullivan is such a crude and hysterical polemicist that he long ago became a worthless if not virtually unreadable commentator. He is also utterly careless with basic facts. The case of Jill Greenberg simply adds an exclamation point to Sullivan’s disgrace of the Atlantic.

More: The magazine is refusing to pay Greenberg and is considering a lawsuit.

Posted in: John McCain, Media Bias

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#456411

On September 15th, 2008 at 7:57 pm, Ahenobarbus said:

Dang, next thing you know they’ll be tricking him into wearing a turban.
#456422

On September 15th, 2008 at 8:09 pm, committed said:

OT. My husband was just watching CNN and Campbell Brown says they are going to fact check the candidates and it would be a No Bull No Bias report. OMG, they really believe their own hype??
#456435

On September 15th, 2008 at 8:24 pm, Batman said:

All day long I’ve felt like I’ve seen that picture of McCain before. Then it dawned on me… I have: http://www.supermanhomepage.com/images/characters/lex/luthor2.jpg

It’s from the comic book cover of “Lex Luthor: The Unauthorized Biography” written by James Hudnall (artwork by Eduardo Barreto and Adam Kubert).

I wonder, did Jill Greenberg take that Obama-in-Superman-pose picture too?
#456458

On September 15th, 2008 at 9:08 pm, thelcabroadside said:

I just created my own picture of Jill Greenberg, I think it’s better than her’s of McCain:

http://thelcabroadside.wordpress.com/
#456469

On September 15th, 2008 at 9:20 pm, miron said:

I suggest she be deported back to her land of birth.
#456509

On September 15th, 2008 at 10:07 pm, Bill Grant said:

“Maybe he will sit down with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad without conditions.”

Nope, that is the alternative; the fellow that you don’t have any cute nick names (that you parrot over and over) for.

“I am glad McAmnesty is so trusting.”

Trusting that the Atlantic Magazine wouldn’t hire a moonbat?
#456511

On September 15th, 2008 at 10:14 pm, Rob said:

Nope, that is the alternative; the fellow that you don’t have any cute nick names (that you parrot over and over) for.

McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty, McAmnesty,

Braaaaak.. Polly want a cracker???
#456524

On September 15th, 2008 at 10:41 pm, Excessive Moderate said:

All day long I’ve felt like I’ve seen that picture of McCain before.

The “bloodthirsty” pic reminded me of this guy:

http://www.roguecinema.com/article429.html
#456528

On September 15th, 2008 at 10:49 pm, sandyb said:

On September 15th, 2008 at 8:24 pm, Batman said:
All day long I’ve felt like I’ve seen that picture of McCain before. Then it dawned on me… I have:

It’s Pennywise the Clown from that Stephen King book.
#456530

On September 15th, 2008 at 10:51 pm, wise_man said:

Great. We’ve got one idiot who says “LOTE!” all the time. And now another one here whose doing the same thing with “McAmnesty!”

Anyone see the film, the shining?
#456558

On September 15th, 2008 at 11:52 pm, Salt said:

On September 15th, 2008 at 10:51 pm, wise_man said:

Great. We’ve got one idiot who says “LOTE!” all the time. And now another one here whose doing the same thing with “McAmnesty!”

Anyone see the film, the shining?

Red rum!… Red rum!…

Sorry. Couldn’t help it.
#456579

On September 16th, 2008 at 12:55 am, RogerCfromSD said:

Senator MCCAIN will soon be PRESIDENT McCain.
#456585

On September 16th, 2008 at 1:35 am, Cowboy said:

McCain should have known better to have let this individual photograph him. That said, I have never heard of this magazine before. Nor have I heard of US before that erruption.

All I can say is make your thoughts known to the “powers that are” at the offending jerks and then boycott them forever more. And be sure to add Paula Dean to the boycott list since she sees the need to host good old Michelle O and I truly doubt she will have Cindy Mac on her show. No big deal since I can’t stand Dean anyway.
#457191

On September 16th, 2008 at 12:48 pm, RetFireman said:

I read several book on…

So you read other people’s interpretations and opinions concerning these religions. How quaint. But did you actually read the Bible? That would include The Torah (those are the first five books of the Bible, the ones that Judaism is based on because I know you didn’t realize there was a difference) AND the New Testament (that’s the Christianity part. See, Judaism doesn’t do that part, while Christians do the other)? Did you read the Quran? Did you read the writings and teachings of Confucius? Did you sit down with a Buddhist and discuss their religion? Have you sat down with any of these and discussed their religions?

No.

You merely go with someone’s opinion and decide from there. It has been what you were raised to do, and when it suits your feelings, that is good enough. You base all your opinons on those of your parents and teachers, never going out to find things out yourself and formulate your own opinions based on actual personal knowledge.

Don’t worry. You are not the only person who does that. You are in company with every other Liberal, for they merely take what they are told by other Liberals as the truth and disseminate such horrid information amongst others.

We call that ignorance and stupidity. You guys call it “Intellectuals”.

The funny thing is that I now understand the cliche that parents send their kids to college so they can learn how to hate their fathers

You know, I fear this every day. Unfortunately, especially here in California, it is not just the colleges. My daughters are bombarded by this stuff every single day. It comes at them in the television, in the music, in their schools (unfortunately I cannot afford Parochial Schooling like I was fortunate enough to attend), and everywhere they turn. Father’s are bad. Someone has two mommies. Fathers are “deadbeats”, (I won’t go into how I have yet to receive a dime in child support nor can I get anyone to do a damn thing about it), fathers do this, fathers do that and I even remember a time not too long ago when single fathers raising children alone were being accused of child molestation.

Look at the reception that the father of GOVERNOR Palin’s grandchild is getting. Forget that they had planned on getting married prior to her getting pregnant, he is being called some of the most heinous things I have ever heard a kid called and being accused of being forced into a “shotgun wedding”. Obviously, it would be better to be like the Liberals and just abandon the woman to a life of welfare and victimhood.

Just think where Liberalism would be if all these “Baby mommas” actually had men in their lives that took responsibility the way he is and married them and such.

But then, that would mean these girls weren’t just throwing their legs open at whatever party to whoever in “crunkin” the best instead of being intimate with their longtime boyfriend in a committed relationship.

Hypocrisy…thy name is Liberals
#457194

On September 16th, 2008 at 12:51 pm, Bill Grant said:

On September 15th, 2008 at 10:51 pm, wise_man said:

Anyone see the film, the shining?

“Groundhog Day” springs to mind…same thing over and over.