By Shan Shibing

It was reported recently that Ma Yaojun, a citizen of Hubei's Zaoyang City was detained because he was taking pictures of a local court's law-enforcement. While arguing with the chief justice, he was told by the chief justice "I can shoot pictures of you, but you cannot do that to me". Tian Yubin, the chief justice of Zaoyang Municipal People's Court, explained that even though there was no regulation observing that people who take pictures of the court's law-enforcement be detained, the court would do this "habitually", according to a report from July 2's Guangzhou Daily.

In our age, technology is very accessible and it has become an important way for citizens to record their lives and vindicate their rights and interests and realize self-relief. However, a delirium like "I can shoot pictures of you, but you cannot do that to me" brutally broke the vision.

"The interpretation of history all is mastered by the dominating classes. They say it like this and then that. How can we restore the true history? Maybe by writing, but only a few people can thoroughly understand it. That's why I want to restore the history by images," wrote Hsiao-hsien Hou, a famous Taiwan film director, in his article Images and Political Participation. It is an inevitable choice for the public to supervise the function of power through image record. Tragically, the arrogance sensed from the chief justice's delirium is undermining citizen's supervision right.

Laws embody justice with equality as the basis. Unfortunately, even the chief justice considered the "habitual law-enforcement" equals laws. If such "habitual law-enforcement" were recognized within the judicial field, laws would lose all its authority, or even worse - people's rights and interests would be randomly tramped by power.

There have been several reports on prison scandals like inquisition by torture. Many appealed to equip cameras in prisons and interrogation rooms to monitor the functions of power and record the real history which is personified as "a girl dressed up by anybody willfully". However, it is not easy to be realized. A certain power is used to serve the interests of certain group, that's why the accusal of "illegally shooting court's law-enforcement" was fabricated.

(China.org.cn translated by Fan Junmei, July 9, 2009)