What is this world coming to? It seems as though the New York Post has decided that it would be in their best interests to apologise for it's Wednesday cartoon editorial that depicted two police officers shooting a chimpanzee with the caption of "They'll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill".
It is extremely out of the ordinary for the Post to succumb to outside pressures and issue an apology for anything that it prints, but I suppose that the publisher is afraid of a potential boycott and further bad publicity from likes of Al Sharpton and other that were offend by the cartoon, thinking that it was racist slap at President Obama.
Here is the text of the apology:
Wednesday's Page Six cartoon - caricaturing Monday's police shooting of a chimpanzee in Connecticut - has created considerable controversy.
It shows two police officers standing over the chimp's body: "They'll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill," one officer says.
It was meant to mock an ineptly written federal stimulus bill.
Period.
But it has been taken as something else - as a depiction of President Obama, as a thinly veiled expression of racism.
This most certainly was not its intent; to those who were offended by the image, we apologize.
However, there are some in the media and in public life who have had differences with The Post in the past - and they see the incident as an opportunity for payback.
To them, no apology is due.
Sometimes a cartoon is just a cartoon - even as the opportunists seek to make it something else.
3 comments:
Obviously there are many people who feel there are some racist overtones when they look at this cartoon. I for one do not. I don't think its a very good cartoon to say the least, but racist? No definitely not. I also don't think of Obama as a black person...I just think of him as a person just as anyone else. The topic of race didn't even enter my mind when I saw this cartoon. Sometimes I think the people who scream RACE are the ones who see nothing but. The Post has apologized to those who they feel they unintentionally offended. I think thats good enough. Move on and scream about some REAL injustices in life...not a cartoon that was meant for something else!
Tony,
I happen to begrudgingly agree with with you.
My first impression after see he cartoon in the post was that they were mocking Congress, not Obama.
However, the visual was very strong and I can understand how people could very easy jump to a racist conclusion.
I think that the media, whether it leans to the right or the left, needs to be a little more careful in how it presents an issue. many times stories or quotes are taken out of context just to promote a certain point of view. That's dangerous and leads to unnecessary anger and jealousies, which leads to unrest.
It's over now, so let's move on.
Songohan,
Relax, take a deep breath and don't pop a gasket.
I don't think that anyone is trying to take away anyones freedom of speech or expression.
The problem here is that people need to be a little smarter in their parodies.
There are two types of parodies those that are smart and those which sink to the lowest common denominator to make a point.
When we use the lowest common denominator to make a point , you will always open yourself up to criticism.
As I said before, my first impression was not racist in nature, but when it was pointed out to me by a co-worker, I saw how that interpretation could have been achieved.
It will be a fine line that will have to be walked for a while, when it comes to parodying Obama. The parodies need to be smart in nature and not overly offensive.
Given time people will not be as sensitive to the race issue as they are now.
As of today Obama has occupied the White House for exactly 1 month, after his first year, when he has made chioces that have offended everyone, not just the right wing republicans, left wingers may not be as sensitive of some of this stuff as they are now.
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