Everyone’s talking about the latest issue of Rolling Stone, with the picture of alleged Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev on it.
It’s a selfie — what isn’t a selfie now — that’s been used before by journalists, most notably in the New York Times. Tsarnaev looks remarkably calm, handsome, even arranged for a portrait. His eyes are wide and dark and looking right at us. He doesn’t look like “The Bomber” or a “a monster”, like Rolling Stone proclaims in giant typeface to the bottom left of the picture. He looks like a young Bob Dylan. He looks like a privledged child of Cambridge. He looks like the bright and charming kid we all wanted to be or date in high school, which is precisely the point.
It’s disturbing, and it’s brilliant.
It shows how a monster can look, just like you and me. It shows how a bomber can evolve from the same genesis that is you and me. You should read the article. It arcs — from regular person to terrorist, and its fascinating.
This isn’t a glamour shot, something many, like Boston Mayor Tom Menino, have accused Rolling Stone of doing. This is what Tsarnaev looks like. Smart, good-looking, the type that would be popular and successful, and that makes what happened even more baffling. It shows the story is more complicated than it looks — quite literally.
What do you think?
Image Credit: By Rolling Stone [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
