All too often we hear sto­ries of over-zealous secu­rity offi­cials has­sling inno­cent pho­tog­ra­phers doing what comes nat­u­rally: tak­ing pho­tos of beau­ti­ful struc­tures in the pub­lic domain.  It appears this is now hap­ping in Dubai with peo­ple with SLRs being pre­vented from pho­tograph­ing the awe-inspiring Burj Al Arab hotel (in order to “pro­tect the hotel’s image”).

How­ever, it seems the secu­rity offi­cials car­ry­ing out the orders are a bit kinder than their US/UK counterparts:

I wasn’t the least bit upset. In fact, I thought to myself; if all secu­rity guards han­dled these sit­u­a­tions in the man­ner this guard had, you wouldn’t be read­ing all those sto­ries about pho­tog­ra­phers get­ting has­sled and abused by overzeal­ous secu­rity. I think as pho­tog­ra­phers most of us under­stand and respect sit­u­a­tions like this, and a lit­tle polite­ness, and pro­fes­sional cour­tesy, on both sides goes a long way.

via Pho­to­shop Insider