OK, so this made me really upset today.
How far do we still have to go? Is it still necessary to work through some of our deep racial issues that surface in our political cartoons? Apparently so. So tell me; in your view, is cartoonist Sean Delonas a racist for depicting this image of our pres. or is he just making light of a recent monkey slaying incident? And shame on you New York Post for letting this get past your editors.
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Perhaps I’m just not sensitive enough to racial issues, however…
My first reaction was that the criticism was primarily about the quality of the bill and wasn’t so much to do with race. The hypothesis that it’s to do with the race of the man pushing the stimulus is not consistent with the fact that no effort is made to make said chimpanzee look very much like Obama at all. That looks nothing like the President and everything like a dead chimp to me.
I can’t see the Chimp slaying incident as a part of the stimulus bill. An animal almost killed a person. If it were a dog it would have been shot too. No reference of the stimulous bill would have been made to the dog. There will, I think, always be some ignoramus who is thoughtless to the humiliation various ethnic groups have had to put up with.
I am of the older Black generation who was in basically white schools compared to monkeys or apes, or would read the articles of missionaries or explorers going to Africa and giving reports of the African people with tails. Personally, I didn’t not as a child, nor as an adult see the slightest resembulence to my race of people. But the cutting hurt went deep. When I saw this, it revived old feelings, and if newspapers are still being read, all across America theses feelings and depictions are still here.
How far do we have to go before we get past all this? Past this life where people want to be viewed as superior to to others; where fear of unknown ethnic groups are judged as wrong and belittled. I am glad that this younger generation is beginning, beginning to grow past all this fear.
But we are still divided, racially and getting more so, economically. I believe this newspaper should be accountable to what is printed. Free speech doesn’t give one the right to be abusive in any form. Many Americans equate the stimulus bill with the President. No he didn’t write it, but again many folks until recently were not aware of this – apparently neither was the cartoonist.
At 63 I am still sensitive to racial slurs (they were are not allowed in my home). I am still offended by demeaning racial pictures of anyone, not just pertaining to Blacks. I will speak out against them, because it’s not right, but I will also continue praying for understanding between people. I will continue for my little part in the world try to exemplify equality in my living by not doing the same thing.
Jay;
thanks for this.
I find that while the cartoonist may not have set out to make a racial statement – he did so – but perhaps unconsciously, and perhaps maybe that is where “segregation” still lies? In our fearful and hateful unconscious impulses? Just a thought. Either way I still think he is implicitly guilty, but I can broaden that umbrella to include all of us as well.
Your last paragraph reminds me of convo’s I’ve had with African-Americans who share the same sentiment. I guess when racism has been directed at one’s people for so long, we can’t tolerate it when it’s happening to others as well.
Again, thank you for sharing this.
My two cents….some people just don’t think. I am glad that awareness is being raised here but also want to leave room for an honest mistake to be made and grace to be offered.
The cartoon is not about Obama, you idiot. It refers to the CONGRESS. CONGRESSMEN WROTE THE STIMULUS, NOT OBAMA!