On Susan Sontag’s Regarding the Pain of Others:
Chapter 1 in a Paragraph:
In this chapter, Sontag qualifies Virginia Woolf’s Three Guineas, describing the unoriginality of her anti-war sentiment. Sontag condemns Woolf’s assumption that her referenced pictures speak for themselves and the sentiment that gruesome pictures can only be used to prevent war. People can be reduced to things, and war cannot be prevented.
In a Sentence:
Imagery can’t prevent war.
Chapter 6 in a Paragraph:
In this chapter, Sontag conducts a closer examination of images of war. She recognizes that people are drawn to gruesome images, yet it is also human to look away. People are indifferent to suffering if they are safe, and they become apathetic if their compassion cannot have an outlet.
In a Sentence:
Images of pain attract, but not for long if they don’t feel real enough.
Chapter 8 in a Paragraph:
In this chapter, Sontag reflects on the human exposure to depravity. She claims that ignorance of depravity’s existence is becoming more and more of a moral defect with the amount we are exposed to in the modern day. People tend to value memory of events over proper reflection on them, yet photographs are condemned as passive. But we are all just watching.
In a Sentence:
See the depravity in the world and think.