In Ferguson, Uncensored, Tim Dickinson and Scott Olsen employs pictures to inform the American people about the horrors going on in Ferguson, Missouri. He does this not only to convince the audience of a specific side, but to show the importance of the racial tensions going on in Missouri. At the time the photo essay came out, many people in the general population were siding with the police over the African American community. Dickinson and Olsen went into Missouri with the goal of enlightening people of what was really going on, but through his photo essay, it becomes clear Dickinson and Olsen support the Hands Up Don’t Shoot movement. Whether that came about from his personal bias against the police (the photographer, Scott Olsen, was arrested for stepping out of the reporting zone) or because the protestors moved him, does not matter. Dickinson’s photo essay, and this photo by Olsen in particular, serve to challenge public opinion about the events in Ferguson, Mississippi, by allowing the public to sympathize with the African American people. 

One specific picture in the photographic essay depicts a street mostly covered by smoke and a man throwing an explosive at the police (not pictured). The picture focuses on an African American man in the middle of the street leaning back. His posture makes it look like he is on the defensive, only protecting himself from what the police already threw at him. The gas canister between his feet displays that he is defending himself from a police attack. It is already open and spewing gas, while the one the man is holding is not. To the audience, it looks like the man in the picture is just defending himself from the gas canister the police threw at him first. The caption of this picture “[he threw] and explosive back at police” also suggests the police were the first ones to initiate the conflict. In this scene, the police are the “bad guys” because they were the ones that started the conflict by throwing the gas canisters at protestors. Subsequently, because the man looks like he is on the defensive, he is characterized as the “good guy.” The picture shows police brutality against the people in Ferguson. Thus, the photo helps to challenge public opinion about the events going on in Ferguson because, originally, the public had sided primarily with the police, but this picture challenges the public belief that the police are the good guys in this situation.  

The background of this photo also exemplifies how horrible the events in Ferguson were, and helps to challenge the public’s opinion about the unrest. In the picture, white smoke obscures a large portion of the scene, coming from a gas canister by the man’s feet.  The smoke obscuring the audience’s haze is symbolic of how officials in Ferguson were restricting images from coming out of the city that showed what was actually going on. The setting of this picture represents how disturbing the events in Ferguson really were. In the background of this photo, the word “market” is clearly visible, and what looks like outlet stores. This means that tear gas is being thrown in a public place that people commonly gather at, showing how extreme the conflict is. Because the setting is such a common place, the audience can easily picture themselves there, in the situation that the African American man is in, which creates sympathy for this man.

It is also important to note what does not appear in this picture, most notability the police this man is facing off against. However, the audience will assume he is fighting against many officers because it is a common theme throughout the photo essay: one person against multiple police officers. Because the police are not pictured, it becomes very hard for the audience to identify with them. The attention of the photograph is on the man, and because he is the only person in the photo, the audience will choose to sympathize with him over the police, who are unknown entity in the picture. However, despite the fact they are not pictured, the police have a large role in this photograph. The smoke that covers a lot of the picture represents the police. The picture is broken up, with the smoke covering half, and the man in the other half of the picture. The picture shows the separation of the police and the people, when the police are supposed to be for the people. It also shows the conflict between the police, who are represented by the smoke, and the African American community, represented by the man in the picture. This photo challenges the stereotypical role that police fall into, which is that of the hero or good guy.

This photo challenges the role of the police in Ferguson during the Hands Up Don’t Shoot movement. Ferguson and Olsen are making an argument that the police are not necessarily the good guys in the situation, by generating sympathy for the African American man in the photograph. The photo of the African American man throwing an explosive at the police shares similar traits with many other photos in this essay. The theme of “one man against many’ is present not only in what happened to Michael Brown and in this photo, but also in the photo with a man walking to the police with his hands in the air, and the mother with the child walking away from the police. Additionally, violence is a common motif in many pictures with images of tear gas, guns, and gas masks repeated throughout the photo essay. All of these pictures by Olsen challenge the public’s opinion about the police: are they really the good guys? 