When the truth is a lie

I keep this photo on the door of my office. It's a reminder to me that even the truth can be a lie. Very valuable reminder in my line of work.

It's obvious where this photo was taken. It shows a moment, a split second in time where the people turned away from the towers and toward each other. Some people have used this photo to suggest that people from my generation have such limited attention spans that they were already bored by the wholesale slaughter of civilians going on behind them.

This photo is a lie. It hasn't been manipulated in any way - it's an accurate depiction of twenty square feet of earth during a half second. It was even taken by a photojournalist. But the impression it leaves is completely inaccurate.

I deal with people every day who use misleading statistics, anecdotes out of context and word games to lie. This picture sums it all up for me.