Shop owner calls police to have me arrested for taking this photo.




I was passing this shop and thought it might make an interesting addition to my collection of photos of Hong Kong. Just as I tried to take the photo, a woman ran out waving her hand and yelling at me that I was not allowed to take photos of her front window. When I asked her why, she said that the photos in the window were "private".

"But this is a public street and hundreds of people walk by here everyday, if the photographs in the window are private, then how can you display them?" I asked. She didn't like me challenging her so then she threatened to call the police and having me arrested because I was not allowed to take photos of her shop. So I asked her to go ahead, I wasn't going to run away. She went inside to call 999 (Hong Kong's 911) so whilst she was doing that, I took the photo of the store front properly.

She came back out yelling at me and causing a scene such that by passers stopped to see what was going - classic case of her making me loose face. She also switched from English to Cantonese and whenever I said anything, she would say in Cantonese that she doesn't speak English. So I switched to Cantonese and asked her in Cantonese how come she could speak English a moment ago. That took her by surprise, she probably thought I was a tourist.

Anyway, I wasn't going to run away since I firmly believed that I hadn't done anything illegal. The police office showed up after a few minutes and asked her if she was the one that had called 999 and she proceeded to complain to him about me. He then asked me what I was doing and my side of the story. I told him I was a photographer and that I took a photo of her store front from exactly 3m distance and asked if I had done anything wrong.

The officer then looked up a number from a list he had on a small card and made a call over his own mobile phone to consult some expert on the police force. I heard him say in Cantonese "No, he was standing outside when he took the photo, from the street". It took 10 seconds or less for the person at the other end to give his response. The office then turned to the lady and told her she had no grounds to charge me and he could not arrest me. She then started yelling at him saying that even if me taking the photo of her shop was not illegal, still I should be arrested because I upset her or distressed her. Again the office politely and patiently explained that I had done nothing wrong.

She then said something about him arresting me to prevent me from publishing a photo of her shop. And he said he couldn't do that. She then threatened that she would sue me if I published the photo. The officer reminded her that it is not possible to know if and when I would publish the photo so there is no point to charge me with anything now.

As a matter of fact, I told the officer that the people whose photos she put on her front window had grounds to sue her for using their photos to advertise her services, unless she had consent from them, in writing. I began to wonder if this wasn't the real reason she made such a fuss. Perhaps she worried the persons in the photos might see my picture in a magazine and come back to charge her.

The officer took my id and details and told me I was free to go. As I walked away, I saw him take the lady into her store and closed the door behind him as she continued yelling and him patiently re-explaining everything to her. Classic case of trying to give her face.

Normally, under such circumstances, I would politely walk away and not take the photo or I would apologize if someone complained. But in this case, I didn't for 2 reasons. Firstly, I didn't like this woman's attitude, she could have approached me and asked me not to take photos in a less confrontational way, she also didn't need to yell at me in public and cause me to look like I was a perpetrator of some crime. Secondly, I have come across this kind of thinking before in Hong Kong, where by certain people think they own the image on the film inside my camera and have absolute rights to it, not the other way around (talking about photographs taken in public places). So I thought it was time at least one of them learned the reality, be it the hard way.

© evangelo costadimas 2004

Posted: Saturday - March 06, 2004 at 08:07 PM          

©