photojournalism essay

“It was once thought, at least in democracies, that a photographer of the documentary or journalistic persuasion who witnessed a horrific event or situation, or a painful one, would record what it looked like in order to alert society, so that society might respond... [This has] become the stuff of the rearview mirror.” (Fred Ritchin, Bending the Frame, New York: Aperture, 2013, pp. 8-9). 

discuss Fred Ritchin’s statement, taking into account its historical dimension.