The Japanese military atrocities in the Chinese city of Nanking are regarded as being some of the worst in human history, with hundreds of thousands of Chinese citizens killed, beaten, raped, tortured, and bullied by the Japanese soldiers. It is not my intention to doubt the severity of the destruction or the brutality of the Japanese, but a question comes to mind about the comparisons of the destruction to similar events in world history. The number of people killed exceeded that of the Carthaginians killed by the Romans, or of the Indians killed by the Mongols, but without the visual proof that we have for the destruction and pillage of Nanking, can the events be accurately compared? Photographs and videos can lead to sensationalism, in a way that was not possible with the Romans or Mongols. Is the collective memory of an event dramatically altered by having visual proof of it? A snap shot of the true event helps prove that it happens, but with evidence of that one moment, is the memory of the entire event changed?
Isn’t it likely that the massive destruction of Carthage by the Romans would be similarly remembered if there were photographic evidence of the wasteland, the people and the soldiers? Memories of events change and fade overtime, where eventually the true events are morphed into something less than complete and utter fact. Photographs provide evidence to maintain a memory, even if the memory still continues to change over time. 
