If you’ve been on Facebook (or Twitter, or Instagram, or Tumblr) in the past few weeks, you might have noticed snippets of a story from New York City-based photojournalist Brandon Stanton (also known as Humans of New York). You might have seen a picture of a kid named Vidal, or a principal named Ms. Lopez, or perhaps President Obama. You might have been one of the millions of people who have shared this story.
On January 19th, Humans of New York was - predictably - in New York. Brownsville, Brooklyn, to be exact was where the photographer found Vidal, a 12-year-old student at Mott Hall Bridges Academy. In following with HONY’s style of documentation, Stanton attached a quote from Vidal in the Facebook and Instagram post; Vidal spoke of the school’s Principal Lopez. Quickly, the post turned into a narrative even the most dedicated followers of HONY had never seen before. The result was a fractured, multifaceted, and independent piece on the modern American education system, and it changed the way we now look at news, American culture, and fundraising.
The photoblog Humans of New York started as a simple means of capturing life in New York from the average bystander’s vantage point. Displayed only on social media sites like Tumblr or Facebook, Stanton amassed a quick following thanks to accessibility and relatability. Humans of New York quickly became more than a photography experiment; it became social commentary and a new method of journalism.
In fairness, HONY is far from perfect. Its criticisms include a narrow vantage point (it is just Stanton running the show, after all), merely a site of “clickbait,” and the potential for skewed or misinterpreted quotations. Perhaps, in some context, this is true; however, social media is one big grey area - there are no absolute truths on the internet. You can look at Stanton’s work as a portraiture of America or as a sham and a popularity scheme. The interpretation is yours.
Stanton’s choice to further explore Mott Hall Bridges Academy proved fruitful. The school was made of capable and underappreciated leaders like Principal Lopez and developed bright students like Vidal - two uncommon claims amongst many public schools. Vidal and Ms. Lopez created a fund after Vidal’s HONY picture received one million likes that allows children from Mott Hall Bridges Academy to visit Harvard. The fund has raised 1.2 million dollars from people all over the country, and a scholarship has been created in Vidal’s name. Just last week, Vidal and Ms. Lopez sat down with President Obama.
If you go back to each photo -- there are over forty, each with their own short story about Brownsville, Brooklyn, the Academy, and Vidal, among other vignettes -- it creates a remarkable report. I only saw bits and pieces of the story at first, but was so drawn to the vivacity and brazen realism of Stanton’s posts that I had to see the full story. It’s well worth a second look.
Without HONY’s unique structure, none of this would exist. Stanton has a unique and beautiful talent for capturing the essence of American society, but now he’s changing that society, as well. HONY is creating a new type of news. Stanton forgoes the sensationalism of the major media for the exact opposite, and such a formula has struck a chord within the American public. This binary acts in two ways; it highlights the problems with traditional media outlets and creates stories closer to the American experience. In a world where journalists craft stories that don’t exist to create a story (NBC and Rolling Stone seem partial to this tactic), HONY’s pared down picture-quote-and-nothing more format makes the story genuine, unbiased, and powerful.
I continue to return to one picture, specifically, from the set on HONY’s Instagram page. The picture is of President Obama, facing the camera, speaking to Vidal’s profile. Below the picture, the caption reads “You don’t do things alone. Nobody does things alone...Just always remember to be open to help. Never think that you know everything. And always be ready to listen.” Thanks to Stanton, everyone from myself to the President is listening to Vidal. Listening can be a very, very powerful thing.
If you’d like to look back at the story, in its entirety, on your own, here are the outlets where you can do so:
