Morally Questionable Virtual Curation - The Museum of Accidents (GALLERY)

The Museum of Accidents is an online collection of photographs sharing the common theme of something gone badly, or even most horribly wrong.

The collection is separated into categories such as Environmental Pollution, Industrial Accidents (my favourite), Deliberate Accidents (is there such a thing?) and Wreck and Derailments, among others.

This site taps into the vulture in everyone. It does have some amazing images, such as a street suffering the aftermath of the Kobe earthquake.

As a result of its controversial content, this site does become morally questionable and for some, storms into uncomfortable territory. It is clear that some people died in some of the accidents featured, so is it right to include them in the collection?

The description of “accident” is also obviously a grey area. The dictionary says it’s, “An unexpected and undesirable event, especially one resulting in damage or harm.”

I don’t know what the criteria was for placing the Lockerbie Air Crash under the ‘deliberate accident” category, or even more shockingly, the collapse of the Twin Towers. I feel no need to include those pictures here.

What do you think?