As someone who recently ran an image of Vice President Dick Cheney's face in the cartoon body of Elmer Fudd to illustrate a story about coverage for wayward hunters, I sympathize with editors at "The New Yorker" who took such a verbal beating this week over the publication's controversial cover satirizing all the fearsome, ignorant misconceptions about Sen. Barack Obama. For those "offended" by the image, or who find it "tasteless," I say, get over it! This country is too sensitive and politically correct for its own good.
Yes, the cartoon image of presidential candidate Obama clad in what might be described as Middle Eastern garb, fist-bumping a wife drawn to look like a 1960s radical, in front of a fireplace with an American flag burning in it and a portrait of Osama bin Laden above it, is no doubt provocative.
That's the whole point--to provoke discussion and debate, hopefully heated and impassioned, about how some people in this too often clueless society see the Democratic candidate.
A good newsmagazine cover will not only make people stop on the street and do a double-take when they pass the newsstand (that's good marketing), but it will also make people stop and think about the subject matter involved, then hopefully draw them into reading more about it and perhaps even help them evolve in their thinking. (For those who do not believe in evolution, I am sorry if I''ve offended you.)
I think a big problem in this country is that people get so worked up about the smallest, most trivial and superficial campaign issues--such as who is wearing a flag pin on their lapel that day--rather than what a candidate will do in office to improve the country's well-being.
We are getting so caught up in empty symbolism and petty arguments that we can no longer appreciate what really matters.
We have big problems ahead of us. Huge problems. A war to end without leaving Iraq up the creek. A stalled economy to restart. A monster budget deficit to close. An energy policy to craft that weans us off dependence on dictatorial oil producers. A Social Security system to shore up. A health care system to reform so everyone has affordable access to decent care.
The message I drew from "The New Yorker" cartoon is that we should focus on the really important issues and not all the nonsense about Sen. Obama's relatively exotic background for a U.S. presidential candidate.
What do you folks think?
Comments (5)
Well said, Sam.
Journalistic license is just that, freedom to poke fun at those in the spotlight and take potshots at those in areas where their armor is the thinnest. Then step back and see what clamor arises from what you have wrought.
Had the cover showed John McCain dive-bombing a fighter plane into a mosque, what would have been the political implications from other viewers? An uproar from yet another part of the community, yet some guffaws from others. No more nor less silly than what we see here, perhaps.
You're right...we've become too politically correct to recognize a cover on a magazine for just that--a paper cover that draws us to the inside meat of the publication like a moth to a flame.
If all we're going to judge and critique and moan about is the artwork on the cover of a periodical, the real journalist inside hasn't got a chance of the proverbial snowball in hell to show his stuff!
Posted by BJ | July 18, 2008 9:06 PM
Posted on July 18, 2008 21:06
I think it's a crying shame that people are so hell-bent on not offending anyone.
If someone doesn't like what "The New Yorker" put on their cover...don't buy it! If they don't like the subject matter of a sitcom...don't watch it! If they don't like...don't...!
Is this concept really that difficult to comprehend?
I don't believe the biggest issue is that so many people get offended, it's that they are being told when & where they have been & should be offended (instead of figuring it out for themselves).
It's at that point they get their underoos in a bunch and express their "independent voice" by jumping on the bandwagon.
Posted by Chris M. | July 21, 2008 12:12 PM
Posted on July 21, 2008 12:12
Right on, Sam! But the P.C. (and I ain't referring to Property-Casualty) orthodoxy will not die easily.
Witness the "touché" cover cartoon last week in the Los Angeles Daily News, re-run in the July 20 "Week in Review" section of the New York Times (in a section called "Laugh Lines" on page 2), depicting a fictional New Yorker cover identical to the Obama version but with Bush and Cheney as the central characters.
Is the intent to demonstrate the fair play of turnabout, or, as I fear, to return us to "correctness" by replacing the unthinkable Obamas-as-terrorists image with the more acceptable (and hackneyed) Administration-as-terrorists image?
Maybe it shows only poor creativity on the part of the LADN cartoonist, but it also demonstrates the tyranny of single-sided thinking. Scary.
Posted by Steve D. | July 21, 2008 2:30 PM
Posted on July 21, 2008 14:30
Sam, I agree as long as you are an equal opportunity offender.
Mr. Obama and his people think that any comment against him that is not adoration is racist and not worthy of comment. This is a man who joins with Mr. Ayeres and his wife, who are unrepentent terrorists who blew up public buildings in their activities for the Weather Underground.
When you live with haters like Ayres and Dorn and his so-called minister, you must be ready to be painted as a hater.
Don't whine, explain.
Posted by Barry Zalma | July 21, 2008 2:41 PM
Posted on July 21, 2008 14:41
Methinks the New Yorker protests too much.
You put a provacative cartoon on your cover to provoke. Fine. Surely, the provoked should speak up as well. Many have.
The New Yorker's gotten its publicity. The message has gotten out. If there had been no response, it would have meant that nobody was paying attention to the New Yorker.
(For example, Sam, did anyone from the Vice President's office (or Warner Bros) complain about your blog? I'm guessing it's not they approved, it's just they've never heard of it.)
I'm sure everyone at the New Yorker is quite happy. But this is last week's news (literally).
SAM RESPONDS.
Not a peep out of the veep's office. As for Warner Bros., I was not the first to pull the Cheney-Fudd combo--I saw the New York Post do it right after the shooting, followed by many others. As social commentary/satire, it was fair game.
Posted by Craig | July 21, 2008 2:58 PM
Posted on July 21, 2008 14:58