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Commentary: NY Post cartoon is racist and careless - CNN.com: "...has to be seen through the lens of America's racist past..."
(Via CNN Politics.)
Ok, most anyone who (to borrow a phrase from a comment left to the above editorial) has been within 50 feet of a news source in the past week, knows about the chimp who was killed by police after attacking a woman. The same thing goes for the news about the latest stimulus package and who wrote it.
For those who have been in hibernation for the past week, a pet chimpanzee in viciously attacked and injured a woman friend of the chimp's owner. The chimp was killed by police. Also, Senators and Representatives in the Capitol finally hammered out a bill laden with pork and wasteful spending but which contains just enough legitimate stuff to qualify as the economic stimulus package that is such a high priority for President Obama.
So the Washington Post published an editorial cartoon showing: "a cop is holding a smoking gun and, with another officer, looking at a bullet-riddled body of a chimpanzee. The caption reads: 'They'll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill.'" (Quoted from the above referenced article.)
Ok... a political cartoon combining recent news events. Nothing new here.
To me and others I know... it is clearly a shot at Washington Politics where they've continually monkeyed around, padding their pockets and pretending to do good for the American people. I.E. the opposite of what President Obama promised during his campaign.
However, Roland S. Martin, Reverend Al Sharpton, the New York Association of Black Journalists and others looked at that cartoon and interpreted the chimp as representing President Obama.
According to Roland S. Martin (whose columns I normally enjoy), "We all know that the stimulus bill was the first priority of the new president, so when reading the caption, it was easy to infer that the cartoonist was implying the president of the United States."
WHAT?
Umm... No.
You might be able to infer that IF you were already predisposed to bigotry and prejudice while not having a clue about what's going on in Washington. Which based on his prior columns does not describe Mr. Martin.
You might be able to infer that if when you see a chimp, you think black man and when you see President Obama you see a black man.
"What could be seen as silly humor if President George W. Bush were in the White House has to be seen through the lens of America's racist past, as noted by the leaders of the New York Association of Black Journalists, who also are demanding an apology from the Post."
Put away the lens of America's racial past and get over it. Don't forget it, just don't dwell on it. Doing so has helped to make, in my opinion and experience, Black Americans the most prejudiced and bigoted race in the United States as a group.
Some have been anxiously waiting for the racial slurs against President Obama to surface. If you look at everything for any hint of prejudice or bigotry, you're going to find it; Even if it exists only as a figment of your imagination.
When I sat down to write this, I realized that I didn't even have a category to do with race. That's how little it means to me. Perhaps I'd feel differently if I was a Black American looking for headlines. But as a mongrel (mostly white but 1/8th Native American) the differences in skin color make as much difference to me as differences in hair color.
Not so to those who look at the U.S. President, a man with a black father and white mother and see, not a man, but a BLACK man. Since I guess technically he's 50% black, that means he's also 50% white. These people are the same who'd look at a glass 50% filled with water and say that it is half empty.
So... you prejudiced bigots out there, starting looking through the lens of reality. I think that most of us agree that racism and bigotry is bad. So why are you perpetuating it?
