Was in the middle of writing this when I got dragged out for lunch. I was involved in similar discussion on Reddit, and I think some people there raised very valid points on the matter.

First issue was the deceitful nature of photo editing. Now, if we go back to the history of photography, camera equipment might have been invented to record "factual images". However, even back in the days, there were things that got adjusted during the printing process - like the cropping, exposure, and contrast. While these sound like simple adjustments, they can drastically alter the mood & the message of the photograph. E.g. imagine if we have an image of someone staring down & intently observing a strange object, then the message of the image was "that object is strange". Now let's crop that strange object and we are left with the image of the person staring down with perhaps slightly furrowed brows, then the message is "this person is in a heavy or angry mood". Should the photographer be condemned for cropping & hence deceive the audience, or should we accept that the nature of photography has always been subjective & perhaps even deceitful.

Then the 2nd issue. Since the introduction of digital photography, manipulation (removing/adding objects into a photo) has never been easier, but did it actually start after digital photography was introduced? I'll let Wiki explain:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photo_...y_manipulation
Well, basically although manipulation was probably never the intended direction of photography, manipulation has always been engraved in the history of photography. Meaning, challenging the definition of "photographs" would require challenging all the early photographs too, including the one that was printed on the original Lincoln five-dollar bill. What actions should be taken then, perhaps removing all these images from the history of photography & photo museum/gallery, retract any statements/awards that deem these images as good "photos", then perhaps also remove any materials that reference these images as photos?

Of course these cannot be applied to some photography genres. And I think I should mention, these are some of the stuff I caught from another discussion, not my personal opinions.