Photograph of Black Physicians Saving KKK Member: Fact Check

Story:

Historical Photograph of Black Physicians Saving KKK Member

Other Versions

1. Black physicians treating in the ER a member of the Ku Klux Klan

2. Black nurses saving a KKK member

3. African American doctors attempting to save the life of a Ku Klux Klan member

4. Black Surgeon attending to a member of the KKK

Fact Check:

The message doing rounds online in various versions purports to show a dramatic historical Photograph of Black Physicians Saving KKK Member. The Ku Klux Klan (KKK or Klan), refers to the three distinct secret movements at different points in time in the history of USA. They advocated extremist reactionary positions like white supremacy, white nationalism, anti-immigration, followed by Nordicism and anti-Catholicism in later iterations. The photograph shows what appears like a group of all black physicians attending a white man in the emergency room. Despite the look, the photograph does not actually show Black Physicians Saving KKK Member.

Image of the Staged Advertisement for Large Magazine — Staged Advertisement for Large Magazine

Not Black Physicians Saving KKK Member

Firstly, as suggested in the story, the photograph is not a historical one, and is not even a real incident where a group of black physicians saved a Ku Klux Klan member. In fact, the photograph shows a staged scene in a series of advertisements for Large Magazine in Australia. The ad campaign carried the caption “For people who think bigger than they are“. It showed depictions of people acting nobly in adverse situations. You can see below couple of other photographs from the ad campaign. This particular Print Ad titled KKK was done by DDB Sydney advertising agency and was released back in November 2004.

Image of Series of advertisements for Large Magazine — Series of advertisements for Large Magazine

The staged photograph gained prominence because Ku Klux Klan was dedicated to terrorizing black people. There are incidents in past where some of the black people died after getting denied treatment in “whites-only” hospitals.