cropping doesn't alter the moment captured. or, rather, you're also cropping when taking a picture - no camera can capture all 360 degrees.

so what is being captured is altered from the get.

yet i don't think you'd argue that the act of taking a photo is the same as photoshopping a giant giraffe into a photo :P

i don't think arguing that taking a photo which is cropped/enhanced (as in sharpening, color correction, ...) is akin to changing what's displayed in it.

those distortions only serve to let us better focus on what truly happened in a moment, not change the moment in essence.

what about keystone correction? A staple in any proper digital image editing tool