Especially for those who have shared sensitive personal experiences and haven’t dealt with the media much, I try to explain where they fit into the story — to make sure they understand the process. Sometimes people argue for changes, sometimes they ask why I wrote what I did, but in almost every case, the discussion ends positively and the person feels more included.

As for migration, I think there are some basic best practices that journalists can follow when writing about it. For example, I don’t use terms like “wave” or “invasion” when describing migrant inflows, especially not when it’s related to asylum seekers. That kind of language has been used for decades to stoke xenophobia, and it’s loaded — it suggests that migrants are always a threat.

Also, it’s important to rely on data to encourage reasonable (rather than emotional) debate. At one point on our evening panel, for example, Professor Foster asked the crowd to guess what percentage of all migrants coming to Australia arrive on humanitarian visas. One member of the audience guessed 40 percent.

The actual number? Two percent, if all temporary visas are included; 10 percent if you look only at permanent migrants who have arrived since 2000. In general, it’s far less than most people think.

“Hard Truths,” the photo exhibit, includes stark images from countries where many refugees come from — Iraq, Cuba and Venezuela among them. And it’s worth asking whether the media’s attention to these places contributes to the perception that asylum seekers are far too numerous for wealthy, successful countries like Australia and the United States to handle.

But by the same token, what would the world be like without these images that aim to help us understand? Maybe it’s not the images that are the problem so much as the way they are interpreted and used for politics. How we handle them is up to us. They present us with an opportunity — if only we’ll engage.

As Julian Burnside said at the end of our panel last night, citing the name of a documentary film about Germany and its history of hate: “Never look away. Never look away.”