In an emotional, 10 minute-long video, climate activist Vanessa Nakate called out the Associated Press for cropping her out of a photo featuring fellow activists Greta Thunberg, Luisa Neubauer, Isabelle Axelsson, and Loukina Tille in connection with coverage of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Since the activists spoke together, Nakate was surprised to see herself, the only person of color, cropped out of the photo. She took to Twitter to reflect on the incident, which she described in the video as “the first time” she “understood the definition” of racism. While the AP has not personally reached out to the activist to apologize, the news agency issued a statement by executive editor Sally Buzbee Friday and has removed the photo from its website, replacing it with one including the Ugandan activist.
"I was cropped out of this photo! Why?” Nakate initially wrote on Twitter Friday, and shared the AP article in question. The video she shared hours later quickly went viral. In a statement to BuzzFeed News, a spokesperson for the AP said, “There was no ill intent. AP routinely publishes photos as they come in and when we received additional images from the field, we updated the story. AP has published a number of images of Vanessa Nakate.”
But the AP’s lack of “ill intent” does not lessen Nakate’s pain. The activist told BuzzFeed News she cried after seeing the photo, not only because it was an act of racism but “because of the people from Africa.” In her video, she expounded on this concern, emphasizing that Africa is the most affected by climate change. “It showed how we are valued. It hurt me a lot. It is the worst thing I have ever seen in my life,” Nakate said.
The 23-year-old activist has gathered much support online and sympathy for the racism she has faced. Fellow activists Thunberg and Axelsson also took to Twitter to share their thoughts. “It has come to my attention that more than one article has cut @vanessa_vash out of the photos. That is unacceptable, her voice is just as, if not more, valuable than ours in a place like this,” Axelsson wrote in a tweet.
As much as the AP may regard this issue as an “error in judgment,” this was and will remain an act of racism. The agency’s excuse that the photographer had cropped various photos and was under a tight deadline is a poor one, as well as weak reasoning to dismiss racism. While the statement by the AP claims the agency trains its “journalists to be sensitive to issues of inclusion and omission,” this action shows that training is evidently lacking.
Nakate asked a crucial question in her video: Does she have no value as “an African activist?” Or is it that “people from Africa don’t have any value at all?” People of color are often erased from advocacy movements, so this is not an isolated incident. Nakate’s experience follows creator Tarana Burke’s erasure from the mainstream #metoo movement, which quickly swept through Hollywood. This controversy’s only positive outcome is that it has sparked a greater conversation on people of color’s erasure from activism coverage.