A Single Picture Tells No Stories

It has become popular to post links to "photographs that changed the world", often accompanied by such uncritical commentary as "When you look through these, you're reminded of how truly powerful a single still image can be - how it can capture and convey an idea and tell a story."

On the contrary, in almost every case, these pictures hold very little story content. We only know the story because of the surrounding text, captions, larger news context. Were that context to be lost, say some far-future archaeologist finds this data cache, its difficult to imagine how anyone would be able to tease out much more than broad generalizations, mostly negative. about humanity from such images.

This is a great danger today, when people increasingly learn their news only through visuals, never acquiring the greater context of events. We are easily and happily duped through the manipulation of visual language. Without understanding root causes of such events, how can we possibly be equipped to find lasting solutions?