12-year-old Devonte Hart, Sgt. Bret Barnum share hug at Ferguson rally

In this photo shot by freelance photographer Johnny Nguyen, Sgt. Bret Barnum (left) hugs 12-year-old Devonte Hart during the Ferguson rally in Portland on Nov. 25, 2014. According to Sgt. Barnum, the moment took place at the beginning of the rally while speakers were addressing the crowd. He noticed a young man with tears in his eyes holding a "Free Hugs" sign among a group of people. Sgt. Barnum motioned him over and they started talking about the demonstration, life, school, and art. As the conversation ended, Sgt. Barnum pointed to his sign and asked, "Do I get one of those?" The moment following that was captured in the powerful photo above, which shows the young man tearing up again during the embrace. After the exchange, the young man rejoined his friends and Sgt. Barnum went back about his duties. Johnny Nguyen/Special to the Oregonian

(Johnny Nguyen/Special to The Oregonian)

The image of a Portland police officer and a young African-American boy hugging went viral – more than a million hits in a weekend – because of its simplicity.



What could be more welcome and healing in the wake of Ferguson than a photo that offers an instant view of hope and reconciliation? Can't we all just get along? Yes. Here's visual proof.



Yet to the protesters who've taken to the streets of Portland almost daily since the Ferguson decision, and to skeptics elsewhere, the simplicity cuts another way. Devonte Hart's tears scream of fear and sadness, they say, not relief.



"That child is in trauma," said Intisar Abioto, who runs the photography blog The Black Portlanders. "And he is not the only one."



Since the earliest days of photography, photos have held a special documentary power. The rise of the Internet and social media, which allow something like the photo of that hug to go around the world in a few clicks, have only increased the possibilities that one image can become the symbol of an entire war, sports season or political movement.



"A picture is often used as a stand-in for a lot larger discussion," said Jonah Berger, a marketing professor at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School and author of "Contagious: Why Things Catch On." "An image isn't just an image. People decode that image. Is it a riot or a march? Is someone embracing someone to comfort them or was there anger before this happened? What do those tears mean? The more a photo like that one spreads, the more deconstruction is likely to occur."



Johnny Nguyen, a 20-year-old freelance photographer, was one of a half-dozen photographers who surrounded Devonte and his mother at a Nov. 25 rally downtown. Abioto said she and Alex Riedlinger, a 27-year-old taking portraits of protesters, were the only black photographers at the scene.



Devonte Hart was crying, his mother Jen Hart said later. The 12-year-old boy worries that when he grows up, his life will be in danger "for simply being."



His mother encouraged him to face his fears and talk with police officers sitting nearby on motorcycles. Photographers began taking pictures as he walked, trembling, toward the barricades.



"I was scared," Riedlinger said. "I was taught you don't approach police at rallies. I was very surprised and intrigued, but also anxious for the safety of the child."



The boy froze before speaking to Portland Police Sgt. Bret Barnum. The officer shook Devonte's hand then held it as they talked. Then Barnum looked back at the boy's "Free Hugs" sign.



"It was an opportunity that I couldn't resist and couldn't miss," Barnum told an Oregonian photographer later. "I just pointed down to his sign and said, 'Hey, can I have one of those?'"



Devonte leaned forward for an embrace. Nguyen took seven photos. Riedlinger and a handful of other photographers snapped away, too. Abioto didn't feel comfortable taking a photograph, in part, she said, because she felt the trauma she saw in Devonte's tears mirrored the trauma she felt after the Ferguson decision.



Nguyen's photo, featured on OregonLive.com, exploded. More than 440,000 Facebook users shared the photo. The photo was featured on NBC's Today show, ABC News, CBS News, MSNBC, Fox News, USA Today, Time.com and reached No. 1 on the social sharing website Reddit. Mayor Charlie Hales announced plans to send a copy to President Barack Obama.



Saturday Night Live even poked fun at the hug -- the show's Kenan Thompson, playing Al Sharpton, went out on the streets of New York City to hug an officer there.



People began calling it "The Hug Shared Around the World."



Other post-Ferguson images showed violence, anguish and anger, Nguyen told an Oregonian reporter. His showed hope and humanity.



"I think, deep down, that's how every human being wants it to be," he said. "That's what people want to see."



The blowback, less prolific in page views but no less emotionally intense, started immediately.



"I think people clung to this image for solace and healing, which in itself isn't a bad thing," Abioto said. "But when I saw that picture, I didn't feel those feelings at all."



Abioto and other critics said the image oversimplified the real problems of race relations in America. In the country's rush toward a feel-good moment they had missed the big picture: Ferguson wasn't just about individuals. It was about systems of oppression. One hug wouldn't fix that.



Jonathan Jones, a columnist for the English newspaper The Guardian, called the photograph "nonsense."



"It is one moment among many, and the choice to look at it and celebrate it is clearly a choice to be lulled by cotton candy," Jones wrote. "In the context of the completely unresolved and immensely troubling situation, not just in Ferguson but across the United States, where Ferguson has opened wounds that go back centuries, this picture is a blatant lie."



That dispute – between people who find the photo heartwarming and those who consider it an easy distraction from the actual issues being protested – is possible because photographs are subjective.



Photographs are records of events, but they're also interpretations, said Fred Ritchin, a former photo editor of The New York Times Magazine and now the dean of the School at the International Center of Photography.



"There are things that happen, but they're often taken out of context when they go viral," Ritchin said. "In the old newspaper model, editors put pictures in context. Now things go out there with no context. The image means what you want it to mean."



As the picture made its way around the world, Riedlinger and Abioto tried writing essays about what the moment meant to them. Riedlinger's piece, in which he shared his photos and suggested the framing of the Nguyen's photograph did not tell the whole story of the moment, has been shared nearly 24,000 times.



"Every picture I've seen of this crops out the circus of photographers that surrounded these two creating a captive audience," Riedlinger wrote. "With such a captive audience I can't really say that the officer did anything that his superiors wouldn't have told him to do."



News sites began writing about his essay as if it were an expose. Several magazines reposted Riedlinger's photos with a shocking assertion: The famous Ferguson hug photo was staged.



Riedlinger never said that, but once again, different people can view one image in different ways.



"I've seen people say the photograph is a lie. It's not a lie. The photograph doesn't lie," Abioto said. "The photograph is a photograph. It's a rendering of reality that has flaws."



That is, a picture is as much Rorschach test as historical record.



-- Casey Parks & Anna Griffin