When discussing images of conflict images that upset and shock, it is difficult to skirt the idea of compassion fatigue.

This is a recognised result of being subjected to quantities of material that affect us emotionally and may be traumatic. It can be seen clearly in some professions such as care givers, or even doctors, who during the course of a typical working day can come into contact with much suffering and so as a coping mechanism, become desensitised to it. When talking about media coverage and images, it means an audience's lack of emotional response to material that previously would have triggered a strong reaction. Solid explanations of the subject and examples of compassion fatigue are to be found in Susan Moeller's book Compassion fatigue: how the media sell disease, famine, war and death. In the book she sets out her arguments and beliefs as to why and how compassion fatigue sets the agenda for news organisations reportage of a story or issue, and also influences the set of news values enough that it can and often does result in a story not being covered by an outlet at all (Moeller, 1999, p10). It is summed up succinctly in a quote from a foreign editor with the New York times in the book, Bernard Gwertzman, the same theme just dulls the psyche. For the reader, for the reporter writing it, for the editor reading it (Moeller, 1999, p10). Moeller goes on to hypothesise that it is in part due to the short attention spans of the contemporary news consumer and the desire of news producers to capture that sliver of attention that so many worthy causes and crises go unreported in the press and why, even when they do get mentioned, they sometimes just disappear from the news cycle without having been resolved, for example famine in Sudan and unrest in eastern european states (Moeller 1999). The award winning 2002 film Cidade de Deus (City of God) presents a story of murderous children, death as an everyday occurrence and the long term and far reaching traumas a harmful and dangerous environment has on a community and individuals. If the story is taken without historical context as a dramatic narrative it arrests the audience's attention and its themes and moral subtexts are interesting and persuasive. The story is based on true events taken from the life of a Brazilian photographer Wilson Rodriguez, and this element of true life story gives the events and lessons even more weight The plot follows life in the Favelas or slums of Rio de Janeiro in Brazil, and portrays it as a continuous battle against poverty, gang violence, drugs and death. When released, the film was met with critical and commercial success, and succeeded for a time in bringing global media attention to the problems highlighted in the film.

As highlighted in an article called Slumsploitation by Melanie Gilligan, the film was at the beginning of a large wave of films depicting the slum violence in Brazil. The Article criticises the exploitation of the real life horror of living in the favelas for the purposes of entertainment. It is undeniable that the mix of exciting, true violence; awe-inspiring scenery; drama-filled story lines and the image Rio has internationally for being a top tourist destination anyway ensure already that films about the city have a good chance of being profitable and well received by an international audience. The Brazilian government does not support film production in the country, rather they provide tax incentives and breaks to corporations to sponsor film projects. This, as would be expected, leads to films being made with financial profit as their main goal, not highlighting the problems that are shown on screen. The situation that results is that the situation is being made internationally visible, which is good, but, all the money made is going back into a system that perpetuates the massive class divide between the poor slum dwellers and the rich middle and upper classes (Gilligan, 2006). There are many dramatic films and also many documentary films about this small but important theme. Noted among them are Onibus 174 (Bus 174) (2002) about the hi-jacking of a city bus, Pixote (1981), about a boy living on the streets and suffering at the hands of the police, and Tropa de Elite (2007), a film written by a former member of an elite fighting unit whose sole duty is to control the drug gangs of Rio's slums. News From a Personal War (1999) is a documentary from the director of Cidade de Deus, Ktia Lund. These are all good films, but all about the same theme. As we have seen above, it is repetition of themes that lead to compassion fatigue. The amount of films made, and the bursts of international press attention all draw attention to the situation but, as with other crises, the attention soon shifts when the images and stories repeat themselves. This is pointed out in a way in an article by Tom Hennigan of the Irish Times in 2008 asking of the local Brazilians if they had become so accustomed to the violence it no longer seems exceptional, going on to quote figures of 6 133 murders in the state that Rio de Janeiro is in for 2007 (Hennigan, 2008). The lack of audible international outcry over this figure suggests that internationally, this is very much the case.

There has been so much attention given the slum's problems, all in the same vein, that the extraordinary violence has become banal and little effort internationally has been made to find solutions to the problems or answers to the violence. It seems that they are empty images in a way. The images in films and media are not being used to their full potential in an educational way, or in a way to raise awareness of a situation, merely as entertainment and do not demand a response. The problem is that when images and stories of the conflict that are produced to effect change and to educate do emerge they are given less importance in news organisations in accordance with their own news values, because the major themes in the story have already been shown as entertainment, and have been shown so much the prospective audience is already suffering from a compassion fatigue and so wants to see something else presented to them to engage with. There are indeed a few reports in international media about the violence, but if an archive search is done of some of the worlds big newspapers1, the vast majority of the articles are about what a splendid holiday destination Rio makes (the upper class, safer areas though), reports on deforestation and related stories or international business dealings in the city. There is a clear lack of international attention paid to the situation that is referred to, in all seriousness and gravity, as a war zone in the News From a Personal War documentary by a member of BOPE2, the elite police unit that operate in the slums (News From a Personal War, 1999). There are, however, some who are passionate about the issue and try to present it in different ways than is usually experienced. Photographs, both professional and amateur, of the daily happenings in the slums are relatively rare. The inhabitants have very little money and so for the most part cannot afford cameras to document their lives, and the gang rulers are generally nervous of professionals who try and enter into their territory due to a firmly rooted, and often deserved, mistrust of anyone they see as an outsider or agent of the state.

1 Search was carried out on the archives of the New York Times, the Guardian, the L.A. Times, the Irish Times and Le Monde. The results are illustrative only, they are by no means intended to be used as results obtained from a properly conducted study of the coverage of Brazil or Rio internationally. 2 BOPE (Batalho de Operaes Policiais Especiais (Portuguese for Special Police Operations Battalion)), are a world renowned urban guerrilla combat unit. They are the unit of the police that tackle the gang territories in the slums, complete with an extensive arsenal of munitions tailored to suit every eventuality. They often launch attacks in a specially made armoured car, Caveiro (Big Skull). Everything about them is designed to intimidate and operations are often very visually striking. The 2006 book, Elite da Tropa, was written by two former BOPE captains, Andr Batista and Rodrigo Pimentel, and a sociologist. It describes the unit as a 'Killing Machine. More information can be found on their website http://www.policiamilitar.rj.gov.br/bope/.

One photographer who has made his name taking photographs of the slums is Severino Silva. A working photojournalist for the Brazilian newspaper O Dia, he too describes the situation in no uncertain terms, It's like a war . . . For you it's your work, one more day at war (Phillips, 2008). He has won awards for his reportage of the slums and the crime in the city of Rio. Though there are many photojournalists working in the city, his talent and eye for an image make him stand out from the pack. He has been profiled in the Guardian newspaper in Britain and his images are used internationally in reports about Rio's crime. He spends his working hours in a bullet proof vest, a necessity in the slums, and takes his pictures often in the middle of shots being fired all around him from high caliber rifles in inexperienced and desperate hands. He is constrained, as with all photographers in active combat zones, by his own safety and his willingness to take risks. His images are mostly utilitarian in nature, illustrating the action as it happens to accompany a written report. However, when it is a little quieter, his work is more reflective and aesthetically pleasing. His picture of an armed police officer in an attacking position (fig.1, Appendix I) is not in black and white, but does really only use two colours. It is taken from a set of seven shown on the guardian.co.uk website story about his work. The roof slats over the officer's head reflect the light hidden by his body and appear golden in colour. The lights below are also golden and the two shafts of light envelope the subject and cast him in an almost religious glow. The image is reminiscent of stained glass windows and paintings of religious figures standing with light streaming from behind them. There are no recognisable features of the subject, no human characteristics shown nor police insignias. The photo makes an icon of the police and glorifies them. The simplicity of the composition belies the complexity of the meanings behind it. An interesting aspect of this particular image is the way it has been used by others in publications and articles about police. A web search for images from Silva has this image as the first one to appear, and it is included in most sets of his work. It is used as an image to support the police and their work. It is no surprise that Silva made this image, having seen first hand the type of work the police are against and often relying on them for protection during his work.

The other image of his is another that appears in the Guardian photo set and ones similar to it, also taken by Silva, have been printed in the spanish paper El Pais among others (fig.2+fig.3, Appendix I). It is uncompromising in it's stark depiction of the inevitable result of clashes between highly trained police units and armed gang members. The image is a perfect illustration of the vast gulf of difference in the combat readiness of the two sides of the war, the police and the gang soldiers. The police are shown standing around in fairly relaxed poses while six clearly visible corpses lie on the ground in frond of them, already on blankets and mattresses that serve as makeshift stretchers to carry and drag the bodies down the steep streets of the favela and off to the morgue. The police have body armour, proper combat clothes and communications to co-ordinate an attack. The dead at their feet have none of this. The image shows that the gang members are prepared to fight and die against a much better trained and equipped force than themselves, even if it is just for pay. The image has an almost placeless quality, showing a desperate situation that is repeated worldwide, that of a well armed force taking on an ill equipped rebel faction. The image shows the viewer that the situation is not unique to the slums of Rio, this could be any military force in the world after a mission in an urban setting. There have been questions raised over the practices of the BOPE, and the brutally harsh tactics they often employ. This photo shows that the slums are a war zone like many others around the globe and answers criticisms of the unit's tactics by showing that if the enemy are behaving the same as the aggressors in military conflicts, then it is unreasonable to ask the police not to bring their practices in line with military practice. Silva, through his work, shows himself to be sympathetic to the dangers of the work carried out by the police, but also to the desperate situation faced by those living in utter poverty in the slums. Some of his non action photography shows life in the favelas when there is no violence, putting on display to the world lives touched by poverty, but also happiness with family and community life. He tries to capture in his work a feeling that there is a life in the slums that does not revolve around the gang violence, however it is the nature of his job that means these photographs do not often get published and are quite difficult to find online.3

3 Some examples of Silva's photography that display the less violent side of life in Rio can be found along with other photographs of his that are unquestionable violent in nature can be found in an excellent set put to video on youtube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=paRZZkzyjyM.

In the biography section of the New York based, Japanese photographer Q. Sakamaki, he says of his work The main objective of such coverage is always the same, focusing on people: how war affects ordinary civilians, particularly children (qsakamaki.com). The images in his set titled 'Rio Favela Survival' focus on the residents of the slums and how they respond to the on going violence and threat of harassment from both the gangs and the police. The images are infused with a sense of despair and hopelessness, showing the streets as they are in stark reality and also giving a hint at a possibility of a better life. Shot totally in black and white, the images reflect the depression that the subjects in the photos show. As he was not working as a photojournalist covering a story like Severino Silva, he was able to consider his subjects more and his collection has a lot more poignancy and subtexts than a collection of Silva's work. The image of the old carnival poster illustrates the photographer's view of the whole situation (fig.1, Appendix II). This is an image of a subject that advertises a celebration and a happy time. The tear in it becomes the focus of the image rather than the happy face of the cartoon dancer. In the tear we can see crumbling plasterwork and remnants of other adverts papered over. As a symbolic image it simply says that there is a lot more to the favela than just the crime and violence that make up his own project and the sets of other photographers that cover the area. The image is taken close up, making the viewer guess at what it's surroundings are. The condition of the wall behind the poster and of the poster itself lead us to imagine that the surrounding area is as torn and depressing as the image itself. The other images in the set also, to some extent, make use of this technique. Sakamaki wants those exposed to his work to connect with it and uses each image to initiate a questioning in the viewer's mind wondering what the surrounding real life story to the moment captured on film is. Each of his photographs have something missing from them, either an unknown destination or an occurrence happening off camera that the viewer must ask about.

His set comprises several images falling into the category of aftermath photography. He shows the fallout from the violence of the gangs and the police and also of the ordinary citizens of the slum. One of the most unsettling of his images in the set is that of the corpses of a mother and two children in a bike cart (fig.2, Appendix II). It is explained in the caption that these deaths are not a result of gang activity or the police, but of fatal domestic violence. The caption places the blame firmly on the gangs and street crime in the city and the way those factors affect its people in a variety of dimensions (qsakamaki.com). The image presents a situation that is by no means documented as well as the public street violence but no less present in the lives of the slum dwellers . The bicycle in the image makes connections in the viewers own mind of an everyday object that they have intimate experience of, being used as an accessory to an act almost unheard of in it's brutality and violence in our safe western communities. Even more affective than the connection between the everyday object in the image is the caption which bluntly states that this level of violence is common in the slums. The idea of having this level of violence is expected to be one so alien to the viewer that it provokes a near visceral, physical response. The image is understated, showing only enough of the bodies to make sure the view knows of their existence, concentrating on the symbolic meaning of the bicycle and the connotations that has for the viewer. Moving forward from Q. Sakamaki's images showing the repeating cycles of violence and aftermath of conflict, the photographer Joo Pina shows us in his set, entitled 'Violence in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil', than even with a threat of violence always hanging in the air of the favelas, community life can sometimes proceed as normal. This is only a minor theme of his set but an important one. The images encompass scenes of religion, family life, work and play as well, of course, as scenes of the aftermath of and preparation for violence. His collection is also in black and white, but the graphic and uncompromising nature of his photography separate it from Sakamaki's work.

His image of a young man armed with a high-caliber rifle playing table football with a friend sets out in one frame the ongoing contrast between life and violence in the slums (fig.1, Appendix III). Everyone in the image, including four children, are relaxed and having fun with the game. To the children there is nothing out of the ordinary with being around high powered weaponry or gang activity, it has always been that way for them. The gun carrier is at ease and confident in carrying his weapon around in the open. Indeed, it appears to have a greater meaning for him than just protection. It seems that it is not necessary for him to have his gun strapped to him at this moment, he is obviously not expecting an attack as there are children around and he is completely at ease with his surroundings, having a gun on him would interfere with his gameplay also. The image speaks volumes about the role of the gun in the slum society. The young man is posing for the camera and wearing his weapon it as a status symbol, a badge, a way of projecting an image of how he wants to be seen even in his relaxed state. The idea of having direct thematic contrast is extended from single images to the entire set with incredibly graphic images preceded by and followed with images of a calmer nature. The second image in the set is of the corpse of a woman who appears to be pregnant (fig.2, Appendix III). She is photographed in a body bag, in a temporary coffin, with her belly exposed, eyes opened, and with debris and blood on her body. The details in this image are numerous and each prompts revulsion. The way her eyes are open, showing that she is not even afforded the dignity of having them closed to avoid a glassy death stare; the blood dried on her head; her opened jeans; her exposed belly and part of her breasts; her awkwardly posed arms. All this and more give the image an incredible, raw quality that leaves a mark on the viewer that colours the rest of the images and stays in the mind after viewing has ended. This image is included to upset the audience and provoke response. A reaction of repulsion is expected. The image appalls the audience by touching on engrained moral values and lessons. In civilised war women and children are traditionally considered untouchable; and dignity in death is usually given a victim by civilised combatants. These are two major ideas that are shown almost a mirror opposite in this image. As the image has no context or caption we do not know who she was a victim of, the gangs, the police, or possibly a domestic attack. The image is a graphic and uncompromising indictment of all involved, using the strongest possible imagery of innocence lost, that of an unborn child with no dignity afforded it or its mother. Pina even includes himself in the line-up of those to be criticised. It was he who recorded the woman at her most degraded, no matter if he was the one who posed her in such a manner. The absence of anyone else in the photo suggests he requested she be left like this for him to capture, thus implicating himself in her post-mortal degradation.

Pina shows both sides of the conflict in his set. There are non-traditional images of the elite police force deployed in the slums, depicting them looking anxious before or after inevitable clashes with the gangs, and showing the flag-draped coffin and funeral of a fallen officer. There are images too of funeral scenes of civilians or gang members killed in the slums. A religious theme is very noticeable in the images with groups and individuals shown praying or through the use of specific symbolic poses and the image of Christ that stands on a hill overlooking the city and her slums. The three photographers and their works briefly looked at in this essay are only representative of the efforts being made in the favelas to bring to a wider audience the daily struggles faced by the inhabitants, the police and the gangs. Rio de Janeiro is advertised and promoted by the government as a beautiful tourist destination. It has a reputation for having accomplished plastic surgeons, beautiful women, weather and beaches and a thumping party atmosphere. These things may all be true, but they are the poster of the carnival dancer in Q. Sakamaki's picture, covering up the reality of vicious, unrelenting violence and crime. The work of photographers and those working in other media to bring to an international and caring audience is both nobel and worthy of attention. However, it is possible it is not going to make any difference. Unlike most crises we see images of, this one is not one that can be helped in any meaninfgul way by a normal viewer. One cannot donate money to help the situation like with an earthquake or famine. It is not a declared war, only an internal problem of high crime to be dealt with by the state police, albeit one more serious than most, so international military or peace-keeping forces cannot be sent to help. The police are undeniably corrupt, sometimes selling the gangs guns from the backs of police trucks, and those that are genuine in their efforts to police the gangs are already being criticised over their tactics that some say are too violent. It would be difficult for them to do more than they already do and avoid serious human-rights abuses.

International awareness would not be a bad thing. It could only help the situation if foreign governments took serious notice of the issue and sent high level tacticians and advisors to help. However, the media only has a limited amount of influence on events. This essay is not going to try and offer solid solutions to the problem, but will conclude with saying why it is unlikely they will not be solved by bringing attention to the cause. In Piers Robinson's article on Operation Restore Hope in Somalia and media influence in that conflict, he mentions a theoretical model created to explain the influence of the media in a conflict. He notes that according to the model media influence occurs when there exists (1) policy uncertainty (. . . ) and (2) extensive and empathy framed media coverage (Robinson, 2001, p943). Neither of these conditions exist in this instance. The government and police are sure of their tactics and are not going to change them. The media coverage is sporadic and any negative reporting is outweighed by all the positive advertising by the tourism board for the city. The favelas will continue to produce and inspire beautiful, terrible, graphic and emotionally charged images. The everyday atrocities will continue, and will continue to be documented. The images produced will find an audience of varying receptivity in countries that maybe have the power to affect change in the situation, but change will not come. The images produced are aesthetically pleasing and emotionally challenging, however, they are all broadly similar in content. There is only so much difference in imagery to be found in such a closed area with such little social or economic progression or evolution. Compassion fatigue could very easily soon set in and the already small amount of useful attention paid to the issue could be depleted even more.4

4 A documentary called Abaixando a Mquina (Lowering the Machine) about photojournalism in Rio de Janeiro was made and released in Rio in 2007. A trailer can be found at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGk6J59C7OE. The documentary covers the reporters working in the slums, the ethical and safety issues they face, and also shows life as viewed through the lens of the city's journalists. It includes interviews with many photographers and examples of their work.