When photos lie.
March 25, 2014 9:19 AM   Subscribe

"Stevenson High's star player Jalen Brunson was in the process of scoring a Illinois state semifinal record 56 points when he sank what would have been a three-point shot. The basket was waived off as a foul. Brunson raised his hands in protest. Photographers captured the moment." But what really happened?

The Journal Star's sports blog published the photo Friday under the headline, Bits of Madness: Excellence soured by poor sportsmanship. People reacted, including the executive director of the Illinois High School Association, who suspended Brunson from Saturday's tournament game. The suspension was overturned minutes before the game started.

The next day, Chicago Tribune photographer Scott Strazzante published a rebuttal under the headline, When Photos Lie: Sticking Up for Jalen Brunson. Strazzante had shot twenty photos in less than three seconds at the same time as the Journal Star photograph, and they tell a different story. Poynter has video [first link].

The Journal Star photographer said on Strazzante's Facebook that he regrets publishing the image:
I captured the image that caused this controversy. Should I have put my image of Jalen Brunson's gesture during Friday's semifinal game on social media? probably not. It was a judgment call between myself and our sports editor who wanted it online. The caption was questionable. Was he directing his gesture to fans or reacting simply to the call? Intentional or just a reactionary gesture in the heat of the moment. I admit that I didn't have the answers at the time, nor did I analyze the situation frame by frame. If I had the choice to decide again, I would not edited the image for the web because I don't have the answers to those questions. My intent was never make an opinion or judgement on the player and the gesture he did during the game, and am sorry for any harm the photo may have caused to him and his family. You're right Scott, sometimes you just don't realize the impact a single image can bring and the message it carries. Thanks for the analysis on this incident that overshadowed such a brilliant game that night by Jalen Brunson.
Brunson said via Twitter, "I apologize for the image that was captured in last nights game but I do not apologize for the action because I didn't do what was portrayed."
posted by The Girl Who Ate Boston (69 comments total) 11 users marked this as a favorite
 
That caption wasn't "questionable," it was an outright lie that publicly disparaged the character of a child. Christ, what an asshole.
posted by saladin at 9:23 AM on March 25, 2014 [32 favorites]


As thousands of people across the Internet try throwing up their arms and paying attention to the position of their middle fingers.
posted by benito.strauss at 9:33 AM on March 25, 2014 [9 favorites]


"Next up: Host of live cooking show chokes on food and accidentally says a word that sounds like 'fuck'. Should she go to jail? More on that at ten."
posted by suedehead at 9:36 AM on March 25, 2014 [2 favorites]


Those aren't his index fingers. The video does show how brief the gesture was, but it clearly was that gesture, even if momentary.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 9:38 AM on March 25, 2014 [7 favorites]


Should I have put my image of Jalen Brunson's gesture during Friday's semifinal game on social media? probably not.


"probably not"?

Here's an image that captures my response.

Don't worry - I had to hold it for the five seconds until my camera's timer took the picture, so there's no doubt this one was intentional.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 9:39 AM on March 25, 2014 [16 favorites]


Were those middle fingers photoshopped in? What is the controversy here?
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 9:44 AM on March 25, 2014


The video does show how brief the gesture was, but it clearly was that gesture, even if momentary.

Yep. I could care less too. It's stupid. The foul was before the shot so they waved it off. He was slightly exasperated at that for about 3 seconds. The headline was seriously making a mountain out of a molehill.
posted by cashman at 9:44 AM on March 25, 2014


But think of the NATIONAL TRAGEDY that would've occurred had a young human being, after a very frustrating call, DARED point his two middle fingers skyward.

It's been said again and again: Americans are a weak and fragile people. The mere hint of an extended middle finger, the edge of a nipple, or the utterance of a swear word under one's breath will bring our civilization to its knees. Children will cry in pain. Blood will run in the streets. And it's one thing if the person flipping the bird or saying the naughty word is white, but a black American doing one of those things? Oh, good lord. It's literally the same as detonating a nuke in New York City. Literally the same. Literally.

Thank god the cranky old cultural biddies are around to protect us from these threats.
posted by chasing at 9:44 AM on March 25, 2014 [45 favorites]


This is why I never believe candid shots of anything. People do all kinds of crazy gestures and faces for a split second in transition from one action or expression to another. Too easy for editors to pick and choose what they want to portray.
posted by history_denier at 9:45 AM on March 25, 2014


See, I thought the video looked like he did it on purpose, not that he accidentally brought down all his fingers but the middle ones.
posted by jeather at 9:47 AM on March 25, 2014 [1 favorite]


It would be really cool if Poynter would put the video somewhere else where it could be shared and watched by people freely. Like maybe Youtube. One wonders if that might help the world see more clearly that this is obviously unfair. But I guess that's not really in the cards.
posted by koeselitz at 9:47 AM on March 25, 2014


Here's an image that captures my response.

Oh my god if there would be a campaign across America -- children, teachers, celebrities, politicians -- all flipping two birds in solidarity, I would be the happiest boy in the world.

The mere hint of an extended middle finger, the edge of a nipple, or the utterance of a swear word under one's breath...

I feel like I'm reading ad copy for a New Jersey-scented perfume commercial.
posted by griphus at 9:49 AM on March 25, 2014 [19 favorites]


I think he was like "Fuck it," and his fingers moved to Fuck It Position, and then he was like "Oh shit that's not cool," and his fingers did the slow fade.

Then along comes a shady photographer and a slow news day and he's gonna have a bad time of it for a while.
posted by Mooski at 9:50 AM on March 25, 2014 [4 favorites]


This was not unintentional. You can clearly see the birds in flight from frames 4 through 11. But putting that picture up is like catching a frame of someone mid-eyeroll - it's not representative of what the photographer, or the crowd, actually saw.
posted by 0xFCAF at 9:51 AM on March 25, 2014


No way in the world that was a "gesture" as opposed to a moment in a larger gesture of throwing-up-the-hands that happened to be caught randomly on film. This is bullshit.
posted by edheil at 9:52 AM on March 25, 2014 [2 favorites]


Were those middle fingers photoshopped in? What is the controversy here?

The headline and the photo strongly implied that the student intentionally flipped off the arena when a call didn't go his way. The implication was so strong that the student was briefly benched. But that's not actually what happened. A student started to make a celebritory "hands in the air" gesture that was prematurely aborted when the foul was called. While aborting the gesture, his hands intentionally or unintentionally made "The Bird" gesture.

Personally, if the kid says it wasn't intentional then I believe him.

It would be really cool if Poynter would put the video somewhere else where it could be shared and watched by people freely.

Is the video at the bottom of the first link region-blocked?
posted by muddgirl at 9:53 AM on March 25, 2014


Amazingly fast middle fingers. Doesn't look like he even thought about what he was doing. Lightning quick. So unfair. Barely noticeable. That newspaper article is fucking awful. Hate to ask the obvious question but if it was a white kid?
posted by ReeMonster at 9:54 AM on March 25, 2014 [9 favorites]


God help us all in this new age where every last little bit of our humanity is exposed, naked and raw, for all the world to scrutinize and use for their own agendas.
posted by charred husk at 9:54 AM on March 25, 2014 [10 favorites]


what mooski said
posted by GrapeApiary at 9:55 AM on March 25, 2014


It does look like he was flipping the bird.

Maybe not at anyone it particular and it hardly matters that he did but I don't see how someone accidentally extends both middle fingers while closing all of the rest.
posted by Reggie Knoble at 9:55 AM on March 25, 2014


A student started to make a celebritory "hands in the air" gesture that was prematurely aborted when the foul was called. While aborting the gesture, his hands intentionally or unintentionally made "The Bird" gesture.

Just for clarification, he wasn't celebrating at all. The first thing he did was signal 'count the bucket', and when he saw the ref waving it off instead, he threw his hands up in exasperation.
posted by cashman at 9:56 AM on March 25, 2014 [1 favorite]


One of the late night shows has a recurring bit where they show short video clips of famous people talking and then isolate a frame from the clip that captures that person with a horrible, goonish expression on their face. This is the equivalent of that.
posted by Atom Eyes at 9:57 AM on March 25, 2014 [1 favorite]


It was a judgment call between myself and our sports editor who wanted it online

If you're looking for pointed fingers, there's a giant one right there, from the douchenozzle photographer saying "my boss made me do it"
posted by stupidsexyFlanders at 9:58 AM on March 25, 2014 [3 favorites]


Just for clarification, he wasn't celebrating at all. The first thing he did was signal 'count the bucket', and when he saw the ref waving it off instead, he threw his hands up in exasperation.

I watched the video a number of times and wavered between deciding if throwing his hands up started as a celebration of the bucket or an objection to the call. My reading of the timing was that it started as a celebration, but it happens so fast on video that it could go both ways.
posted by muddgirl at 9:59 AM on March 25, 2014


In fairness to the original photographer, apparently his newspaper's strobe system only captures one shot per second as opposed to the ten per second that Strazzante was shooting. That may or may not change people's opinion of whether the photo was unfairly cherry-picked from the larger event, but it's relevant. It's not like he went through Strazzante's twenty images and picked the most damning.
posted by cribcage at 10:00 AM on March 25, 2014


Just for the record, I don't actually care if he flipped the bird and don't think the pictures should have been published the way they were. But the video to me looked like "hands up in celebration what the fuck you jerk uh shouldn't have done that let's pretend it was an accident".
posted by jeather at 10:01 AM on March 25, 2014


It does look like he was flipping the bird.

Check the video. I agree that that's what it looks like. It's all but invisible in the actual timeframe of what was happening. Frustrated gesture, sure. The argument is that the excerpting of the one decontextualized image plus the headline turned this into A Thing when it didn't need to be a thing.
posted by jessamyn at 10:01 AM on March 25, 2014 [11 favorites]


It's not like he went through Strazzante's twenty images and picked the most damning.

I would agree, except there didn't seem to be an issue until the picture was published. Seems like if it had been as big a deal as the picture made of it, they've have booed him the hell off the court, and the refs would have given him hell.
posted by Mooski at 10:02 AM on March 25, 2014 [2 favorites]


Here's an image from the end of the Edgbaston test match in 2005 when England won a squeaker against the world's best ever team and their greatest rivals, Australia. It is one of the most famous cricket images of the modern period.


Flintoff (bowler) and a distraught Lee (wearing helmet) share a moment in the hurly-burly of victory and defeat; the two are sportsmen first and competitors second; a moment where the competitive nature of sport comes second and the simple camaraderie ..., etc, etc.

Here's video footage of the same moment. (go to 1 min 20).

To me, Lee seems to react as if Flintoff is merely adding to his misery rather than sharing his pain.

This isn't a dirty trick with a subtext, like OP's example, but it seems to me similar in that it misrepresents a moment in order to make it more newsworthy.
posted by devious truculent and unreliable at 10:02 AM on March 25, 2014


The whole thing reminds me of this image from the Obama / McCain debate. Like, yes, that's a real picture, but it's not like McCain was lurching along after Obama making monster noises -- he had an awkward moment trying to figure out whether to break left or right around something and he made kind of a self-deprecating "drr" face for a moment.
posted by KathrynT at 10:03 AM on March 25, 2014 [14 favorites]


Also, it makes zero sense that a player's immediate reaction to a call not going his way would be to flip off the referee.
Whine, yes.
Plead his case, sure.
Shout "What the fuck??", absolutely.
But the only way you could possibly think that immediately flipping off the ref makes sense is if you've never played an organized sport or never seen one on TV.
posted by Atom Eyes at 10:05 AM on March 25, 2014 [2 favorites]


it happens so fast on video that it could go both ways.

Ok. It really isn't germane to the point in any big sense, but it isn't a celebration at all. The arm in the air with the finger gesturing down is an inquiry about counting the bucket. The ref waves it off. He gets exasperated. There is no point of celebration.
posted by cashman at 10:05 AM on March 25, 2014 [1 favorite]




To expand on my reaction photo above (because even if a picture is worth 1000 words, it might not say the ones you intended), why the "probably not" galls me more than anything isn't just the use of the photo but the diatribe under the photo and headline. The woe-is-our-world where an excellent athletic performance is totally marred by a maybe-gesture is bullshit. It expands that "maybe" into a "definite" and is ridiculous to boot.

Further, he wasn't given a technical foul so it's not like it affected the game. It wasn't noticed at the time. All the controversy after the fact happened because of the picture being published online. Even if he's the best basketball player at his level, he's still a 17 year old high school student. Even if the evidence was much more damning, putting it in such a place of importance doesn't make you [insert respected sports photojournalist here]; it makes you an asshole.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 10:10 AM on March 25, 2014 [7 favorites]


And anybody who starts to herf derf analyse about whether it too was a flipping off needs to be banned from the internet sooner than later.
posted by MartinWisse at 10:12 AM on March 25, 2014 [1 favorite]


Admittedly, I am bringing my own bias (where I grew up vs. where I call home now) to the outrage because downstate Illinois folks thinking of Chicago high school athletes -- even Chicago suburban high school athletes -- as 'classless thugs' is definitely A Thing, so the location of where it was published and where the student was from is viewed by me through this lens as well.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 10:14 AM on March 25, 2014 [7 favorites]


Part of the problem is that there's an incentive to run this type of photo (along with an inflammatory and misleading caption). There will be no consequences faced by the newspaper for running it, and now they've churned up a ton of page views.

And instead of talking about this young man who just dropped 56 points on an opponent (in a losing effort, which doesn't warrant a mention), we're talking about putting his reflexes, emotions, thought process, etc. though a microscope which all the internet can observe and pass judgment upon. Anyone else glad the internet wasn't like this when they were growing up?
posted by antonymous at 10:14 AM on March 25, 2014 [1 favorite]


Let's not pass around the name Jalen Brunson.

Let's pass around the name of the journalist Kirk Wessler, who wrote this:
But in the dying seconds, an emotional and frustrated Brunson turned to the Whitney Young fans and raised his middle fingers at them. ...

What Brunson did in the heat of the moment doesn’t diminish his talent ... But he diminished himself, and he served up on a silver platter a reason for thousands of people to go away thinking the worst of him as a person. It was, unfortunately, a classless exclamation point and made the night unforgettable for all the wrong reasons....

He’s a kid. Kids make mistakes. Let’s hope Brunson learns from this one.
In the dying days of newsprint, Wessler saw a photo that would let him make a cheap, preachy article. What Wessler did under deadline pressure doesn't diminish his talent, but he diminished his reputation, and gave millions of people reasons to doubt his ethics, and the ethics of all journalists by lazy generalization people are prone to. Let's hope that he's still young, and that Wessler can learn from his mistake. A retraction and an apology would be a good start.
posted by benito.strauss at 10:21 AM on March 25, 2014 [32 favorites]


Anyone else glad the internet wasn't like this when they were growing up?

Or just wasn't.
posted by cashman at 10:22 AM on March 25, 2014 [2 favorites]


WAVED off, not "waived" off. It's not even misspelled in the source material you're quoting.
posted by ethnomethodologist at 10:23 AM on March 25, 2014


*blows whistle*

Pedantry foul on number 51566.
posted by Atom Eyes at 10:27 AM on March 25, 2014 [11 favorites]


And1 fav, Atom Eyes.
posted by cashman at 10:28 AM on March 25, 2014


This was an interupted celebratory jazz finger jump to fade-away dual bird resignation and a spectacular example of the move. A still-shot can't show the brilliance on display here.
posted by vicx at 10:29 AM on March 25, 2014 [1 favorite]


Mod note: Just email us or the OP about typos, thanks.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 10:30 AM on March 25, 2014


I have a lot of unanswered questions about the path of reporting. Did Kirk Wessler attend the game? He says
It was, unfortunately, a classless exclamation point and made the night unforgettable for all the wrong reasons.
If you interviewed the fans in the front row who hadn't seen the image, would they point to that incident as being unforgettable? If so, that doesn't match the photographer's claim:
He didn’t even know what he had until he began editing the evening’s photos.
It's a shitty editorial all around, and the fact that it was posted on a blog and not on the op-ed page doesn't excuse it.
posted by muddgirl at 10:31 AM on March 25, 2014 [2 favorites]


if the ref didn't see it, it didn't happen. this is rank bullshit.
posted by bruce at 10:50 AM on March 25, 2014


It's problematic when any kind of brief emotional reaction in sports, whether it be positive (high-fiving nearby fans, doing a chicken dance in the end zone) or negative (frustrated, nano-second long bird flipping) is considered "unsportsmanlike". Which grouping of "sportsmen" are we referring to? Who are these athletes, these paragons of humility, to which all players must aspire? The easy going wealthy, lobbing tennis balls on the grass courts of their estates form lo so many years ago? It's strange that players still get dinged for showing they care with more emotion than an "Aw shucks," and in front of an audience, even.

Now Wessler's article- that's seriously unsporting and weak.
posted by but no cigar at 10:52 AM on March 25, 2014 [2 favorites]


Back and to the right. Back and to the right.
posted by Sir Cholmondeley at 10:53 AM on March 25, 2014 [3 favorites]


If I hadn't seen the still photo, just the video, I wouldn't have even noticed that for less than a section, his two fingers were extended.

Jesus Christ, can't people get a grip? Leave this poor kid alone, FFS!
posted by lupus_yonderboy at 10:57 AM on March 25, 2014 [1 favorite]


But in the dying seconds before the deadline, an emotional and frustrated Wessler turned to the selection of photographs and found one with two middle fingers...

What Wessler did in the heat of the moment doesn’t diminish his talent ... But he diminished himself, and he served up on a silver platter a reason for thousands of people to go away thinking the worst of him as a reporter. It was, unfortunately, a classless exclamation point and made the night unforgettable for all the wrong reasons....

He’s a hack. Hacks make mistakes. Let’s hope Wessler learns from this one.
posted by Spatch at 11:05 AM on March 25, 2014 [2 favorites]


Yes, he flipped the double-bird but pulled it back in. Not quickly enough to hide it from the camera, but that's a goodly amount of self-control for an upset teen. More than I would have been able to muster up when I was a high schooler.

The photo didn't lie. The double-bird happened. However, the Journal Star needed some eyeballs and decided to sacrifice a kid's reputation to get them. I worked at a newspaper for years. I know how this works.
posted by kimberussell at 11:33 AM on March 25, 2014


Hi Spatch.
posted by benito.strauss at 11:41 AM on March 25, 2014


If it happens for a split second, it means the fingers are in motion. The bird requires a steady state, which is only afforded by a camera flash freezing the moment. The video shows fingers in constant motion, index fingers curling in then followed by the middle finger. Do this - keep the last two fingers of the fist curled, an use the index and middle finger to do a "cool victory pointing up in the air with two fingers thing" that pro ballers do. You've seen it. Stop in mid-motion and forget about what you were doing - index finger is more co-ordinated and less tied to the other two fingers, so it reacts quicker. Middle finger is slower to react and come back down, as you were fighting to keep it straight when the ring finger is curled.

More, when the kid says he didn't do it, he didn't do it.
posted by Slap*Happy at 11:44 AM on March 25, 2014 [3 favorites]


It's a shame that Kirk Wessler had to diminish the quality of all of the other photographs of this game with this moment of frustration. It makes it easier for thousands of people to go away thinking the worst of him as a journalist, and, by extension, all journalists.

He's a journalist. Here's hoping he learns from this and is able to become a better one.
posted by scrump at 11:53 AM on March 25, 2014


"Give me six lines written forty-eight frames lived by an honest man, and I will find something in it with which to hang him." - Richelieu (att.)
posted by milquetoast at 11:53 AM on March 25, 2014 [2 favorites]


This is a hometown happening so I have Feelings, but I think the main takeaway from this story should be: "This kid was playing a highly-emotional, high-stakes game and got really frustrated with a bad call that went against him, started to react, and had enough control of his emotions to arrest his instinctive negative reaction."* That is extremely praiseworthy at 17 and a good example for other children. It's hard to learn to control your emotional reactions, doubly hard for children and adolescents, and to have this visual example of a kid who's frustrated but pulls himself back together and regains control of his reactions, that's a pretty strong argument for sports as character-building. And that's how we should be framing it to other kids watching this: self-control isn't innate, it's something you learn and practice and get better at, and you even when you start to react badly you can stop yourself.

*Whether or not birds are flipped, the frustration in his arm-throwing is clear, and just as clear in the video is him taking a breath, mastering his disappointment, and recentering himself.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 12:18 PM on March 25, 2014 [17 favorites]


This is the kind of shit my children will grow up with. Doing a single thing, that takes a second to do, and having people you'll never meet, never know existed if this would have happened 25 years ago, and have them use it to destroy your entire self. This reminds me of the crying KU fan from Sunday's Stanford/KU game. He's emotional, into the moment of something he really loves, and because of that the Internet (of people he'll never meet) made a Twitter account for him and various animated GIFs.

The kid showed emotion. That's it.
posted by stltony at 12:34 PM on March 25, 2014


Are you sure he wasn't showing gang signs?
posted by TedW at 1:24 PM on March 25, 2014 [1 favorite]


Sjinkie Knegt is unimpressed.
posted by brokkr at 1:54 PM on March 25, 2014


Oh, come on, people. This was a crystal clear example of microgesturing. No telling how many people in the stands were offended.
posted by carping demon at 3:38 PM on March 25, 2014


I'm reminded that MIA got fined for flipping the bird at the super bowl. It's so funny to me that these things happen in sports. We've got our half naked cheerleaders over here gyrating go team, we've got our abusive fans yelling everything they can think of, chanting "airball" or "left! right! left! right!" as a player fouls out and then "SIT DOWN" as he goes to the bench, and of course the coach who is frequently demonstratively screaming obscenities at the players.

But omg this skinny 17-year old kid had one finger on each hand bent for a split second longer than the others!
posted by cashman at 4:01 PM on March 25, 2014 [4 favorites]


So making a gesture meaning "fuck you" really sucks?
posted by TedW at 4:37 PM on March 25, 2014


Doesn't seem to be a good career move for a school athlete, anyway.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 6:27 PM on March 25, 2014


index finger is more co-ordinated and less tied to the other two fingers, so it reacts quicker. Middle finger is slower to react and come back down, as you were fighting to keep it straight when the ring finger is curled.

No. The index finger has its own independent extensor tendon while the middle and ring fingers are bound together by common tendons. Only the index finger has free, independent movement. The extensor muscles are weaker than the retractor, since we usually need muscle power to grip, while only minimal effort to release a grip. The natural relaxed posture of the hand is strongly biased towards a closed fist. The middle, ring, and little fingers have limited independent movement. If you close your hand, the middle finger will follow, unless you are making a deliberate effort to extend it.

Test this for yourself. Place your hand flat on a table. Try lifting each finger independently. The middle and ring fingers are harder to lift. Now curl your fingers under, except the index finger. See how easy it is to lift it off the table. Now retract all but your middle and ring fingers, keep them extended while you keep your palm down on the table. Try to lift the middle finger independently of the ring finger. Notice how strongly it tries to stay down.

This is why the gesture is "the finger." It is a gesture that is impossible to make accidentally. If you give someone the finger, you did it deliberately.

The evidence is incontrovertible. The kid made a gesture that required deliberate effort. He chose to give the finger, however momentary that choice was. They have a photograph of it. Why would anyone dispute the clear evidence that he chose to make this gesture?

But more importantly, who gives a shit? People who think throwing a ball through a hoop is a life or death matter? This public opprobrium is the best thing that could ever happen to the kid. He is learning that a single moment of a game, whether it is throwing a finger, or throwing the perfect shot, can make or break your career. This is not dependent on your actual performance, but on the perceptions of a fickle audience of spectators and league officials. It is a harsh lesson. Learn it well, kid.
posted by charlie don't surf at 7:01 PM on March 25, 2014


(1) I accidentally make "the finger" every time I push up my glasses. Using my middle finger just feels natural to me. My middle finger is rather independent from my ring finger - these muscles can be trained easily. In my case it was violin practice, but handling a basketball also requires quite a bit of finger training.

(2) Who, exactly, did Brunson "give" the finger to? In American gestural parlance, the Bird is directed at someone, not at the universe at large. In a situation like this, a player would flip off another player (who were all behind him), or the refs (who were also behind him).
posted by muddgirl at 7:46 PM on March 25, 2014


Here's an image from the end of the Edgbaston test match in 2005 when England won a squeaker against the world's best ever team and their greatest rivals, Australia. It is one of the most famous cricket images of the modern period.

In Flintoff's words, "I was taught as a kid always respect the opposition first and celebrate after, which I did. I went over to Brett Lee and shook his hand and there's that picture, where I whisper in his ear: 'It's 1-1, son.'"
posted by Wolof at 8:21 PM on March 25, 2014


I just watched the video, and boy howdy was that a very brief moment in time. Even the stills don't give the full sense.

The only thing that makes this damning is that they were able to slow it down such that it was now visible to the naked eye. For all practical purposes, it wasn't any different than thinking it in his head. It's kind of like holding him responsible for his thoughts, for all anyone noticed in the moment. I mean, I've had facial twitches, I'm sure, that expressed some sort of f-you in my life. I look forward to the day when intelligent computers can read my emotions and rat me out. (I just finished watching Her, by the way.)
posted by SpacemanStix at 8:51 PM on March 25, 2014


I accidentally make "the finger" every time I push up my glasses

Me too, except it's almost never an accident on my part. It's one of my favorite parts about wearing glasses.
posted by Ghidorah at 8:55 PM on March 25, 2014


After viewing the video, at worst it was an extremely fleeting thought the kid had which he squelched extremely fast before anyone else would even have noticed it under any normal circumstances. And (if it requires any comment at all) that should be cause for praising his good judgement rather than reaming him a new one. IMHO.
posted by flug at 6:00 AM on March 26, 2014


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