We have come together in the midst of COVID-19, alongside the movement to fight police brutality and systemic racism, to assert the rights of all lens-based workers and define actions that build a safer, healthier, more inclusive, and transparent industry.
The COVID-19 pandemic highlights and exacerbates inequities toward workers, especially those who are marginalized (including Black, Indigenous, and people of color [BIPOC]; the working class; women, nonbinary, and gender nonconforming people; people with disabilities; and LGBTQIA+ people). This pandemic also presents an opportunity to rectify these inequities. It has laid bare systemic oppression, heightened community tensions, and as a result, ushered in a global civil rights revolution. This revolution emphasizes dismantling the systems that historically uphold and maintain white supremacy, echoing our call for immediate and sweeping transformation that honors the current moment. This uprising is our collective call to immediate action. The Photo Bill of Rights is a fundamental step in changing our industry and gaining rights and access for all.
The labor and livelihood of lens-based workers (including photographers, cinematographers, video and broadcast journalists, visual editors, assistants, and producers) have been under duress long before this pandemic. This Bill of Rights speaks primarily to the concerns of independent workers, though it is also largely relevant to staff employees.
This document brings attention to the pervasive issues surrounding health, safety, access, bias, ethics, and finance throughout the visual journalism and editorial media industries and offers solutions to establish equitable standards through actionable steps.
Media institutions cannot claim to educate and progress public understanding of injustices while upholding practices that marginalize workers. The white, Western, cisgender male gaze has been used to colonize, disenfranchise, and dehumanize. The burden of recognizing, accounting for, and living with these inequities has been placed on those with the least access to power, resources, and recourse within the industry.
We offer this framework for lens-based workers globally and aspire for this groundwork to amplify existing industry transformations worldwide.
This is not a legally binding document; this is a call to action. This is a guide. This is an ethical code. This is an opportunity to recognize the problems within our industry and act to solve them.
For further context, please see the findings of the Visual Storytellers Survey of 700+ lens-based workers across various sectors of the industry, providing evidence and insight into many of the issues we’ve outlined in this Bill of Rights.
HOW TO READ THE BILL OF RIGHTS:
Every arrow (») will expand the section to reveal the complete text and accompanying action items.
All bolded words are hyperlinked to a glossary with definitions of important words and phrases.
You can access a plain text version of the Photo Bill of Rights here.
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The physical and mental well-being of lens-based workers requires due diligence and transparent access to safety assessment, requisite hazard pay, personal protective equipment, training, and trauma-informed aftercare when necessary. »
Lens-based work often demands personal risk and shall be met with proper assessments and practices that ensure physical, mental, and emotional health and safety; legal and digital security; and respect for identity (including race, religion, gender, sexuality, age, or disability).
Whether on assignment or at industry-adjacent events, workers and those they encounter while working shall be treated respectfully. A supportive industry speaks openly about trauma, uplifts care, practices nonviolent communication, respects boundaries, and dignifies the humanity of all people.
Individual circumstances determine collective well-being. Workers shall be empowered to mitigate risks and make informed decisions for themselves, their families, and the communities in which they live and work.
ACTION »
- Do not penalize workers for raising safety concerns.
- Provide and/or reimburse for appropriate personal protective equipment, hostile environment training, and other necessary safety materials. Recognize that lack of experience or training is used to justify inequitable hiring practices.
- Provide a safety assessment, a communication plan, and plan of action for the worker and their family in the event of illness, injury, detention, or death due to an assignment.
- Implement hazard pay for high-risk or life-threatening assignments.
- Hire locally and endorse workers as an authority on their own communities; local workers can often better understand risks specific to their regions and neighborhoods.
- Prioritize the health and safety of workers and those they encounter while working, including writers, drivers, fixers, local journalists, sources, and community members. Safeguard these individuals and relationships throughout the editorial process.
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Financial respect and security is integral to the success of all lens-based workers. Create a transparent process for timely payment, advance payment, kill fees, and addressing financial and contractual issues without reprisal. »
Equitable and transparent business relationships create a culture of financial security for all. Inefficient payment systems, delayed reimbursement for expenses, predatory contract language, and unclear grievance processes not only waste the time and resources of workers, but also of hiring parties.
Lens-based workers without access to monetary, social, and legal resources are often forced out of the industry. Workers spend countless unpaid hours navigating opaque bureaucratic systems attempting to secure payment for completed labor.
Kill fees shall be implemented when workers are hired for assignments that are cancelled or never published in lieu of initial agreed-upon payment.
Late payment and assignments with upfront expenses require significant cash flow, which is prohibitive for many workers and potentially prevents them from accepting work. Timely payment, advance payment, and reimbursement of expenses ensure the ability to work without incurring financial risk, debt, or long-term harm through credit damage.
Workers shall not be forced to weigh working relationships with hiring parties against the need to collect compensation and enforce contracts. Transparent and respectful exchanges should be the baseline, regardless of workers’ individual financial standing.
ACTION »
- Before the work begins, there shall be a clear and mutual understanding of:
-- Contract, terms, and necessary paperwork
-- Payment timeline
-- Invoicing instructions
-- Direct contact for legal and finance departments in the event of payment issues or inquiries - Ensure timely reimbursement of upfront expenses or advance expenses. Consider implementing penalties for late payment.
- Kill fees for contracted work shall be implemented for work that does not get published or is cancelled before completion. Kill fees and terms shall include the right to seek publishing and licensing elsewhere.
- Ensure copyright stays with the worker by eliminating use of predatory Work For Hire contracts or pay substantially higher rates to account for loss of future revenue.
- Ensure sublicensing rights stay with the worker, enact terms that share revenue from sublicensing, or pay higher rates to account for loss of future revenue.
- Eliminate shadow banning when workers challenge contract terms. Recognize and interrogate how you participate in shadow banning. Move toward more transparent conversations that hold people accountable and that build a supportive community.
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Lens-based workers from marginalized groups are routinely subjected to sexual misconduct and abuse (microaggressions, discrimination, harassment, and assault) while working. Prioritize safety for all workers by proactively addressing concerns and grievances with policies meant to eliminate abuse and sexual misconduct. »
Abuse and sexual misconduct at the hands of individuals within the industry (including sources, colleagues, and superiors) is fundamentally rooted in a lack of respect for individual bodily autonomy and is a product of an industry that remains overwhelmingly misogynistic and racist.
Industry efforts for parity and inclusion are hampered when workers who are marginalized leave the industry as a result of abuse. Abuse has historically been weaponized through promises of professional advancement and/or threats of professional harm. There can only be a safe and accountable industry with a zero-tolerance attitude toward abuse and sexual misconduct.
ACTION »
- Commit to a policy and protocol for receiving and investigating allegations of all forms of abuse and sexual misconduct. Prioritize safety in addressing allegations. Communicate and enforce that policy and protocol clearly to all staff and independent workers.
- Do not use non-disclosure agreements and other legal tools to silence those who have experienced abuse, harassment, or discrimination.
- Eliminate the need for whisper networks by developing institutional memory within individual organizations for retaining information about who is considered predatory, unsafe, and therefore unhireable. Whisper networks alone are inadequate and insufficient to protect workers and shift burden unfairly from those who have engaged in abusive behavior (and their employers) to victims and potential victims who have to take affirmative steps to avoid abusers.
- Do not tolerate abusers. Create a protocol that prioritizes harm reduction and creates accountability.
- Eliminate shadow banning when workers report abuse.
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An ethical industry requires equitable access to opportunities and pay, as well as support for continued growth. Create codes of conduct, training, and clear systems to further identify and challenge implicit bias in decision making. »
Build relationships with a broad base of lens-based workers across identities and hire expansively within these pools of labor. The industry is only as strong as the most under-resourced, under-represented, and under-supported workers.
Accurate and truthful storytelling leads to a well-informed society. This requires safe and respectful access to communities and a deep understanding of the issues, stories, and people being documented. This is achievable through inclusive hiring practices that promote a range of perspectives.
ACTION »
- Recruit, train, mentor, and support lens-based workers who are under-resourced.
- Partner with equity groups to build and maintain diverse rosters of workers, including and especially those local to their community. Revisit and expand this list frequently.
- Establish and implement a comprehensive system to track and analyze hiring practices in order to ensure work opportunities are equitable.
- Create transparent pay structures that show fees across the board. Eliminate pay disparities.
- Eliminate maternal wall bias. Do not discriminate against pregnant workers. Show support for working parents by making no assumptions and instead letting them tell you if they need to change their workload.
- Eliminate shadow banning when workers raise issues around bias.
IN CONCLUSION:
This Bill of Rights is a first step toward working as a collaborative and conscientious industry. Change is possible if we are willing to identify and address consistent problems at the individual and institutional level.
Visual storytelling at its best upholds integrity, respect, transparency, and accountability. Now is the time to work together to build a sustainable industry that is accessible, equitable, and inclusive for all; anything less impedes our ability to be a genuine mirror to the world.
If you are a lens-based worker: co-sign and share this document and the accompanying toolkit with your colleagues to enact more collaboration and transparency in your practice.
If you are in a hiring position: co-sign and use this document to inform improved practices and to advocate for those you hire.
If you are in any position to amplify this message: co-sign and advocate for improved policies and practices to shift the toxic and untenable state of our industry.
The Photo Bill of Rights was created alongside additional resources meant to move the goals of this initiative beyond conversation and into tangible action.
The “Beyond the Bill” offers a starting point for continued development of a more conscientious and equitable visual media practice. Prompts are provided for reflection — for workers to draw their own conclusions, start conversations within their networks, and take action — beyond the Photo Bill of Rights.
Additionally, we’ve created toolkits with specific resources for lens-based workers and hiring parties. These toolkits provide guided processes that can be enacted in the workplace and in the field, expanding on the Photo Bill of Rights to offer templates for practical application.
We encourage you to spend time with each, as a way to further engage, learn, and actively participate in growing a better industry.
We acknowledge this document was shaped by lens-based workers in the United States, where the industry often exploits the labor and knowledge of lens-based workers outside the country.
An international application of these and other rights must be explored by hiring parties. We hope this can be a seed for individuals and organizations beyond the U.S. to advocate for the specific needs of their communities. We will join in, amplify, and support any effort to that end.
[Published June 22, 2020; Updated June 26, 2020]
