Project Islamic H.O.P.E and the NAACP paid a visit to Fullerton today to protest at the home of Marilyn Davenport, the OC GOP Central Committee member who has drawn fire from just about everyone everywhere for sending out an email depicting Barack Obama as a chimpanzee.
An outcry against racism? Sure. Calls for Davenport’s resignation? OK. But these protesters seem to have something else in mind:
Does the office of the presidency demand unconditional love and respect? Should Americans not be “allowed” to insult the President?
Read “Davenport Protesters: Nobody Should Be Allowed to Criticize Obama” on FFFF
Brilliant,
Keep this thing front and center long enough it harms the GOP. Retreat before the backlash begins and it knocks the OC GOP down a couple of rungs.
To bad the Noise Machine Challengers are fighting for justice in Costa Mesa, Tustin and Santa Ana, three cities and communities in which they do not live!
Freedom and our constitution should be first and foremost. When Dubya was in office there was constant criticism of everything he did. Do we have a double standard here. Once you start silencing people because you don’t like what they say remember someone else might feel that you should be silenced also. This is a slippery slope you are going down. The real culprit that no one is addressing is OCGOP leader Scott Baugh. He is the one for pouring gas on this fire and should be ashamed of himself. He is an embarrassment to the GOP. The old expression fits his character perfectly; “with friends like him who needs enemies”. People should be able to confront and hold our politcal leaders accountable without fear of retaliation. When that free speech stops we will be living in communism.
do these folks have nothing better to do . why arent they protesting all the black on black crime , single moms who have no man at the house . going after rev al did he say he was sorry yet for t brawley .. this one sided group was once a proud group now its a joke like the democrats .i hope they keep this up to show how out of touch they are with america and keep huriting the dems WHEN NOBAMA AND THE DEMS LOSE EVERYTHING IN NOV
As I recall most popular jokes were Polish jokes making fun of polish intelligence. On Saturday Night Life were making fun of two Czech guys.
http://czechmatediary.com/2009/05/06/are-czechs-really-this-wild-and-crazy/
I considered it very funny.
If minorities are unveiling to put their humor under a control then It would be prudent to live Separate but equal.
I am tired of these stupid protest by Mexicans, Blacks and White Nelson who occasionally use these rallies to solicit the beer.
The Saturday night live sketch Making fun of Czech guys is miles away from calling a black person a monkey. Your comparison is just ignorant. What if I called you a dumb idiot Polack or Eurotrash scum, would you just laugh it off?
“What if I called you a dumb idiot Polack or Eurotrash scum, would you just laugh it off??……. Hmmmm
You just did… LOL
The problem is that same as Nelson you are suffering from Munchausen by proxy syndrome (MBPS) and it makes you feel good when, in your mind, you are rescuing blacks portrayed as monkeys, same as when you were the teenager you were fantasizing to rescue the chick you loved from the burning building.
Get over it and mature…. become a man the true hero.
Blacks must resolve their complex of inferiority by themselves avoiding daily bitching and demonstrating. This country is a place of opportunity not place for the affirmative action.
First….Where did the log in screen go?
Stan,
Since I am more amused than offended by you random pontifications, I would like to pose a scenario based on one of your claims.
“(Ethnic groups) must resolve their complex of inferiority by themselves avoiding daily bitching and demonstrating. This country is a place of opportunity not place for the affirmative action.”
Here’s the real life scenario
Russell Means, one of the founders of the American Indian Movement (AIM) in the 1970s, decided to eschew Federal funds and built a health clinic on the and a Lakota culutral immersion school (construction in progress) on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation with private funds. In essence, what Dr. Means was trying to do was create a self sufficient society that is not dependent on Federal handouts. grants or whatever moniker you want to put on them. While he and his supporters are making inroads towards their goal of Native self sufficiency, they are still protesting the wrongs that the US Government has committed toward their tribe and the various other indigenous tribes and bands throughout the United States. It’s the usual stuff like treaty violations, crappy processed food forced upon reservations through food subsidies, et al.
So based upon your aforementioned statement, would you classify Russell Means and his followers/supporters as having an inferiority complex because they protest US government policies towards Natives and the government’s violation of various treaties throughout the years?
You’re right, Travis. What a lame & cliched protest. These folks totally missed the point. Of course it’s okay to be disrespectful of a President, that’s a tradition going way back to the cartoonist who drew George Washington as an ass, and won in court.
The point was the racism. How could these NAACP people miss that? Weird.
And talk about leading with your chin. Most of us liberals were TOTALLY disrespectful of President Bush, and I’d be surprised if some of these people didn’t join in.
And it should be “The people united will never be defeated.” Changing defeated to divided might rhyme, but it doesn’t make any sense.
“The point was the racism. How could these NAACP people miss that? Weird.”…… Hmmm
Youuuu miss that!… comrade Vern.
In order to claim racism there must be discriminatory element. There was non.
Since black person factually can’t be an APE, such portrayal is legally non-actionable “OPINION”.
If I would say that Obama is APE because he is black and therefore can’t receive same paycheck as me – that is racist. (defamation/ discrimination)
If I would say that Obama is APE because he is black and therefore can’t be my president – that is not racist. (opinion)
Even if race is the main element in the above statement it must be factual, damaging and malicious to be racist.
Example: There was televangelist Jerry Falwell who was portrayed as having first time sex with his mother. Defamation suit followed. On the stand Judge ask him: Could anybody believe that you have sex with your mother? Falwell replied No..No.. No one! Judge said dismissed!. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hustler_Magazine_v._Falwell
Racism is a form of defamation based on the race. But all elements of defamation must be present.
The Davenport’s email, in the court setting, would have no leg to stand on.
Only on the street judged by moron mongoloids it can survive.
You have again, intellectually, disappointed me comrade Vern
Why are you talking about the racist e-mail going to court? Nobody is suing Marilyn Davenport.
All we’re saying is what she did is objectionable and reflects badly on the Orange County GOP.
I have use the court only as reference to a reasonable setting. I did not imply that email is going to the court. However, one can’t be sure when dealing with the leftist loons.
Fact is that any reasonable person could [not] conclude that any bad reflection on the Orange County GOP occurred.
Only the prejudicial leftists apparatchiks could.
Vern,
I never thought I’d be saying this, but thanks for being a lone voice of reason from the left. Fortunately, people realize how stupid and hypocritical they look and sound so I don’t expect they will be taken too seriously.
You never thought you’d say this? It’s like the third or fourth time you say that.
I appreciate it too. But never forget, I’m as far left as they come! (Just about.) I just like to keep everything clear and in perspective.
I know, I just don’t want it going to your head.
There was a definite theme of respect for the office of the Presidency, and one can assess that however one wishes to, but as to the video itself, I don’t see anything warranting the characterization of the demonstration as “no one should be allowed to criticize obama.”
That’s a stretch…
Well, just a bit of exaggeration on Travis’ part, mainly using the word “criticize.” They WERE basically saying you can’t RIDICULE a President, and the President for the foreseeable future is Obama, so I don’t think he was too far off.
Even though the demonstration clearly held of theme of respect for the office of the Presidency, the first two speakers in the video qualified their statements with respect to the racist email in question.
One could even take the notion of ‘respect’ with regards to the current presidency and see the racial undertones prevalent at times. I pointed this out in a historical criticism of The Fox Nation website for its suggestion that Obama was ‘disrespecting’ the oval office: http://donpalabraz.com/?p=2976
Again, the notion of respect is wholly different from the exaggeration of the ‘silencing’ of critique. There is, after all, the saying “I respectfully disagree.”
“.. and the President for the foreseeable future is Obama ..”
I think that future is about 636 days – countin’ dem daze down here.
I’m not an Obama supporter and won’t vote for him in 2012, but allow me to roll my eyes and say ‘yeah right!’
Go Trump!
I think we’re better off under a moderate Republican like Obama than any of the crazy fascists the real GOP has to offer. As conservative as Barack is, never forget how much WORSE it was from 2001-8. And remember that WE have to be the “change we can believe in” because he sure ain’t.
*Napping headed hose? Not racist? Are you all suffering from Glen Beckitis! Your logic is visably one sided, wrong and ridiculous! Casting ethnic diatribes…..are fine you say….saying what Marilyn Davenport did was just simply funing around…..shows exactly what you are.
Those folks all need to stay on Marilyn’s front lawn….until she resigns! Quits! Hell no won’t go
to another RCC meeting ever!
Something like that!
I’ve heard they are going to recall her. Is that possible?
mod rep like nobama NOW THATS FUNNY . thats like saying pelosi likes conservatives
Winships,
*Napping headed hose?s, ???????
It is not “Napping headed hose” — it is “Nappy headed hoes.”
You guys are so cute …..
Oh … I get. Don’t disrespect the President – like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y7eBRbjrP9w
I already beat you to that, Junior.
“And talk about leading with your chin. Most of us liberals were TOTALLY disrespectful of President Bush, and I’d be surprised if some of these people didn’t join in.”
PRE-EMPTED!!!
Hey look! The Reggie wrote up the protest and quoted some of Davenport’s neighbors. What foolish things they said!
http://www.ocregister.com/articles/davenport-297670-president-obama.html
Quoted in the Register: “Ignorance has no place in leadership.”
I was there. The actual quote was “Ignorancy has no place in leadership.”
Who said the phantom quote in your headline?
My bad. I went back to the tape. The quote I was thinking of is “Ignorancy has no place in this position that she’s in.”
I believe it was the same woman.
I thought you made a good point in your original article, Travis. You subvert it somewhat if you’re gonna start making fun of the fact that some of these black protesters don’t have a first-class education.
Oops, I didn’t read your question right. I already answered on FFFF. The headline came from this quote:
“No one should be allowed to disparage the president or his family.” -Najee Ali, Project Islamic H.O.P.E., 25 seconds into the video.
And I already responded over there too! Like the woman you say you have on tape, I have flubbed words here and there more than a few times myself. I’ve even made up some that don’t exist according to Webster. Call it ignorance if you want to, but at least I’m not guilty of the much more vile form of ignorance exhibited by Mrs. Davenport and her Reggie quoted neighbors.
Gabriel, you might have a point except the same sentiment was expressed by three other protesters in the video.
Fine, it looks like it was a lame protest. But nowhere near the lame ballpark of an OCGOP official gleefully forwarding racist e-mails. Don’t keep trying to change the subject.
Check out those quotes of Davenport’s neighbors for some ignorance!
Remember that an NPR fundraiser was vilified for saying that the tea party folks are ‘seriously racist”? What outrage over what was obviously true! And here’s more evidence.
HELLO I WAS THERE PEOPLE I WAS THE ONE WITH THE AFRO WITH ALL BLACK ON HOLDING THE SIGN I WILL KEEP DOING THIS UNTIL ACTION IS SERVER……POWER FOR THE PEOPLE……
I’ve been thinking more about this protest, and I’m sure these folks MUST have put some thought into how they were going to present their case. They probably concluded (correctly) that it drives OC crackers crazy that they have a black president, and decided their tactic would be to rub it in that they do have a black president.
It’s just too bad that the “always show respect to your President” tack is both hypocritical and unAmerican.
“It’s just too bad that the “always show respect to your President” tack is both hypocritical and unAmerican.”…….. Hmmmmm
Think some more comrade Vern.
The “always show respect to political correctness” tack is both hypocritical and unAmerican.
Brother Vern.
Speaking of protests, and I surely have carried many protest signs in my time, there was one photo that I was too late in taking. Our bus driver was moving too quickly for me to shoot a group of peaceful protesters with hand made signs who a decade earlier would have been shot or sent to a Gulag. I refer to the area in front of the wall at Red Square in Moscow a few years ago.
We sometimes take our First Amendment rights for granted while the OC Register is having a slow news week and continues to drag out this episode. We have all seen cartoons of elected officials be they white, black or any other skin color.
Look at the following Jib-Jab video making fun of W’s second term
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hE8V22unwRo&feature=related
Or this Jib-Jab where Darth McCain says “Barack- I am your father”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GTGQ1kKIAWo&feature=related
And Vern. I know you will enjoy this Jib-Jab entitled the “Founding Fathers rap”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ArFAapn9yeQ&NR=1
Where is alleged racism?…. There is no compensation.
Show me a racism against Bush and then say “it is a OK” as I have done against Obama.
OK Stanley.
Check out this site where they depict president Bush as a monkey and other abusive cartoons. This racism issue can be tracked back to President Thomas Jefferson. No one complained when it was about W but it ‘s a major story when its president Obama.
I guess you won’t be happy until John and Ken put Marilyn’s head on a stick.
Hello folks. She has apologized. We have wars to win and budgets to balance.
We’ve taken our eye off the ball. If the President hasn’t expressed any public comment I would move on.
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=56b_1253215409&c=1
The “Bush or Chimp” defense doesn’t hold weight and arrogantly defies history. Try again.
Gabriel.
The earlier depiction of president Bush as an ape/monkey may have given some a green light that this form of humor might be acceptable. Take note of the number of viewings of those skits.
Did you see the progression in one of the videos where “W” starts as an ape and becomes a human? That was OK with you?? Do I see any bias here??
It’s a false equivalency. Depicting Bush as an ape doesn’t carry the same historical connotations as depicting Obama as one. Learn some American history, please.
Gabriel.
Those who support evolution claim we are all decendents of apes.
And as I just responded to Stanley, how do we know that some of those creating or forwarding the jokes about George W Bush were not black or brown?
I don’t recall anyone on this blog protesting while our former president was a target of similar humor.
The pedulum swings in both directions. Be consistent or move on.
Gabriel is correct!
You must show that white Bush was depicted by non whites as inferior to them based on his white race.
In other words it must be racial defamation with malice.
OK Stanley.
How do we know that some people involved in the Internet attacks against president Bush were not of color?
Gilbert are you actually saying that you don’t know that “monkey,” “coon,”
“jungle bunny,” “spear chucker,” and “nigger” are all equivalent? Come on. That’s lame even for you.
Where is alleged racism?…. There is no compensation.
Did you spell “comparison” so badly that spellcheck corrected it to “compensation?”
Monkey.
“Where is alleged racism?…. There is no compensation.”…… Hmmm
Actually [NO]….. Think!……. It is Yell level English….. similar to Winships.
com·pen·sa·tion (k¼m”p…n-s³“sh…n) n. Abbr. comp. 1. The act of compensating or the state of being compensated. 2. Something, such as money, given or received as payment or reparation, as for a service or loss. 3. Biology. The increase in size or activity of one part of an organism or organ that makes up for the loss or dysfunction of another. 4. Psychology. Behavior that develops either consciously or unconsciously to offset a real or imagined deficiency, as in personality or physical ability.–com”pen·sa“tion·al adj.
The racism.
If anyone should have a beef with racist pxxxxs and illegal immigrants, it’s my people: the various indigenous Indian tribes of North America (aka “Native Americans”). We were here in this country long before before the dumbass Euro-Puritans came over and pretty much raped the land that we once called home and threw us in the segregation/apartheid pits known as reservations. All in the name of “manifest destiny,” “Jesus Christ” or whatever bogeyman was acting as the voices in their heads. Since the Euro-Puritans couldn’t impose slavery and their culture on us, they had to resort to outsourcing their slave labor through coercive and deceptive means.
There’s your “American history” lesson for you.
I could go all Russell Means on your back and forth pissing matches, but I’ll be content to sit back and laugh as my Ojibwe and other assorted tribal brothers, sisters and I continue to exploit your addictions to money and illusory power while you continue your verbal two way masturbatory rhetoric of “I’m not racist, but you are.” There’s your “spiral of life” for you. Or should I call it what it really is? A f’n “merry go round.”
By the way, thanks for the nice dividend checks I get from the tribe.
Vern, you may be on to something.
*Is this Sigmund Freud or Harry Lime that has now become our campus psychologist? Maybe both! Racism in not next to Godliness – in our opinion!
One thing for sure, never let Harry Lime give you the definition of right or wrong!
W. Bush as an ape is a metaphor for criticism of him as having the brains of an ape. This to explains by his critics his decisions he made as President.
Depiction of President Obama and Blacks as Apes is a total different metaphor. It comes from a long history of racism towards blacks as a race that failed to evolve from apes to the degree whites did according to past and present racists.
For the full article with pictures Google the article.
NY Post Says “Humor” Trumps Racism
Posted on February 19, 2009 by prof susurro
Aaah. more “humor” for Black History Month
This image, drawn by Sean Delonas, has created controversy since it hit the stands. Most people viewing it are clear that it appears as a racist image likening the President of the United States to a monkey and depicting his murder as evidenced not only by the dead monkey but also the caption “someone else to write the stimulus bill.” (I think quite a few of the interpretations on the gawker link above are overstated, but it does give you a career trajectory for Delonas that includes insensitivity to several oppressions)
The NY Post responded to its critics with the all too familiar: it is just humor.
However, that humor relies on several pre-existing racist narratives circulating in the U.S.
1.colonial metaphors likening black people to apes and degenerates
2.eugenicist or miscegenation narratives including “the black rapist” as ape or bestial
3.existing political cartoons that depict black politicians as apes or bestial
4.the linking of black skin criminality that has traditionally allowed police to shoot innocent black men without punishment
Colonial Metaphors
As is obvious to most, the NY Post is drawing on the ready ability of its readers to equate black people with apes or monkeys established through a colonial narrative. (As Barbara Walters ignorantly illustrated on the view today, some people will try to argue that it is the black color of the monkey that triggers the connection and that the NY Post could have avoided this drama by using another color. While color matters as part of the overall discourse of race science, the ape itself is a racist metaphor in and of itself.)
The metaphor of black people as apes/beasts dates back to the colonial period. It is based in race “science” that argued human beings fell into several categories written on the body (color of skin, size of brain and/or cranium, slope of forehead, etc.) in such a way as to provide a visual map to the intelligence, civility, sexuality, etc. of an entire people. One such category was “the negroid,” African descended people, who were considered to be both uncivilized and uncivilizable. Part of this discourse/ “science” were questions about the link between Africans and apes and whether or not Africans were actually a different species all together.
Polgenises, the belief that races were distinct species, was originally illustrated by Louis Agassiz in 1855. (see image to the right.) His drawings were included in an 800 page “scientific” text on the origins and degenerations of species the first edition of which circulated more widely than the Bible. The book was the tome through which repsected academics at the nations top universities (here and in the UK and Europe) taught their students the racial prejudices that permeate our world. These drawings cemented the link between African/black people and apes in the global scientific community and ultimately influenced popular imagination as these theories trickled down.
(Camper’s “Facial Angle” for African descended people 1794)
Craniometry claimed to know the developmental lineage of a race and its intellectual capacity through bone structure. Another respected race “scientist,” Camper used his “facial angle” theory, a means of measuring the skull to determine civility, to argue a developmental continuum in which African descended people were the least intelligent and European descended people were the most intelligent. His drawings, as seen above, also argued that Africans were one step away from apes.
Unlike modern evolutionary theories, the link between African and ape in race “science” was meant to show bestiality and permanent degeneracy not the evolutionary process from ape to man that is taught today. This is evidenced by Camper’s own skull arrangement in his academic offices. The arrangement was: apes, orangutans, black people, the “hottentot” (remember caged Saarje Baartman?), Chinese people, and ultimately Europeans. It is an arrangement that was repeated in many universities around the world and is still in evidence today. My alma mater continues to house skulls in display cases next to the labs but has them in no particular order anymore; they claim it would be a “shame to throw them out.”
These theories entered the popular imagination through exhibition and film. Exhibitions began in 1851 with London’s “Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations” but is best remembered through the tragic image of Saarje Baartman, exhibited first in England then France, and the World’s Fair in St. Louis in 1904. What all of these exhibitions have in common was the linking of race science, captive people of color behind cages, and racialized spectacle (or the reinforcing of white superiority) dependent on the idea of otherness and “missing links in the evolutionary chain.” In many of the N. American exhibits, animals were also on display behind cages. One of the most famous, the exhibition of Ota Benga in the Bronx Zoo, put apes and and Africans together in the cage once again cementing the connection. (Ota Benga was first exhibited at the World’s Fair and later given to the Museum of Natural History as part of a private collection.)
Eugenicism
The NY Post is also trading on the narrative of eugenicism triggered by a recent story that some have argued is the inspiration behind what the cartoonist is actually illustrating . The NY Post cartoon references a bizarre case of a white woman with a chimpanzee with whom she bathed, ate, and slept. When her friend came to visit, the monkey lashed out, bit off her hand, and “went insane.” It is believed the monkey felt that its connection to the woman was being threatened. Since the monkey had become uncontrollably violent, two police officers felt they had to shoot it. It had already been stabbed by the unnamed white woman who owned it in an attempt to protect herself and her friend.
The leap necessary to equate the shooting of a crazed pet and the putting down of the black president is one predicated on the eugenicist narrative of predatory black men as beasts/apes as depicted in the original 1933 poster for King Kong (to the right) which not only shows Kong holding a captive white woman but also foregrounds two others in his line of sight.
At its most basic eugenicism argued for either the “proper mixing” of the races in order to achieve a master race/most civilized race or the prohibition of the mixing of any kind with other races in order to protect the existing “master race.” Either version classifies “offspring’s” temperament, civility or ability to participate in civic life, intelligence, and criminality based on the type of intermixing. The closer to black one gets, the more degenerate and uncivilizable one becomes.
In the U.S., eugenicism and race “science” in general, was used to justify slavery. The idea was that black men in particular had to be enslaved because they represented a threat to white women, as bestial predators, and consequently a threat to civilization through miscegenation.
When slavery was over, this same theory justified murders like that of Emmet Till (pictured left), whose body was riddled with bullets in a real life racial murder potentially mocked by the “humor” of the NY Post. Till was killed for looking askance at a white woman and as we all should know, countless black men were also lynched for the same or similar social transgressions. As with the NY Post image that shows a dead ape/black president at the hands of the authorities, lynching often punished black men for usurping established political boundaries and asserting their right to vote, run for office, or otherwise engage in politics.
The media, science, and popular opinion congealed around the bestial black rapist imagined in films like Birth of a Nation (as bestial human) and King Kong (as giant ape). In both the innocence of a white woman is threatened by an out of control bestial black man or ape who violently puts down any opposition to his control of said white woman. Sound familiar?
The image is also repeated in more recent print media like the original cover of Marcotte’s It’s a Jungle Out There and Vogue Magazine. While the later re-imagines the King Kong poster as a black basketball player and a white super model, the latter reinterprets the metaphor in order to empower white women (recast as feminists in an urban jungle) while continuing the de-nig-ration of blackness in the form of the barbaric ape that continues to dog her. (Inside the book, the black man as ape is replaced by the “Indian savages” also held constant by racism while the white woman as victim is re-imagined as empowering through the female cartoon character putting them down herself instead of being saved by a white man.) Whether misogynist or hipster feminist the racist narrative of the black ape oppressors remains.
It is this narrative that motivated the NY Post cartoon otherwise there is no link between the crazed monkey event and the president.
Moreover, these connections should be just as disturbing to anti-racist white women whose empowerment or lack thereof is being articulated through the lens of racism. Both their “virtue” and their strength depend on a continuation of eugenicist narratives about blackness that distract from the fact that white women are more likely to be raped and abused by white men (most physical and sexual violence is intraracial) and are also used to either symbolically or literally kill other people.
Political Comics
The NY Post is continuing a long history of political comics in print journalism that link black and immigrant political aspirations with apes. These cartoons continued the question of citizenship and civilization as well as questioning black political involvement in general. The Philadelphia Inquiry ran a cartoon questioning the U.S.’ ability to maintain democracy based on both “uncivilized” and “uncivilizable” black people in its borders, as implied by the caption, and its recent colonial acquisition of more such people. (see picture to left). The image recreates the ape-beast narrative by both juxtaposing a development relationship in which N. American black people are slightly less ape like than Cubans but where all are still more readily recognized as both ape and savage. In 1915 for instance, pro-Republican, Judge Magazine depicted a jury box with monkeys, drunks, and both black and Italian jurors whose ill-fitting suits point to their inability to be civilized. In both cartoons the image is of a beleagured nation being dragged down by apelike black people.
This sentiment was also depicted more famously in films like Birth of a Nation in which African Americans, not white supremacists, kept people from voting and rigged elections a narrative that resonated in the erroneous blaming of black voters for conservative wins at the polls this election. As a result of their voter tampering, Congress is overrun with “comical” black Representatives who rest their barefeet on their desks, drink whiskey and eat chicken and throw the bones on the floors of Congress, and fall asleep, all while in session. They also are completely ditracted by the white women visiting the gallery, so overcome with those “inherent bestial urges” that they cannot govern. (Image to rt is movie still of BoN’s “Congress” session)
All of these images speak to a supremacist anxiety echoed by the New Yorker cover during the election (see left) and the NY Post cartoon. Whether liberal (New Yorker) or conservative (the post is owned by Murdoch) certain segments of white America remain anxious about the ability of black people to govern. While many will not admit such a fear outright, concerns about the toll black leadership will take on what is imagined as a white nation and white civilization permeated election discourse, opinion polls, and finally the political comics offered up to us by well read magazines and journals. When called on it, the answer was always the same: it is just humor.
(Incidentally, the New Yorker also had a lesser criticized cover illustrated by Barry Blitt in _____ 2008 which resurrected the links between anxieties about white women’s virtue and black leadership, show to the right. In this image, Michelle Obama is replaced by Hillary Clinton as they satirize the 3 am phone call ads. Someone once said that feminism could not succeed because women would no longer have any use for men; the thesis here seems to be that black male leadership cannot suceed b/c then white women would throw off white men. Both of these versions speak to the ways [white] male power operates through sexuality as much as through race and gender. Several feminists of color, Lorde and Hurtado for example, have argued that it is the proximity to white privilege that makes it hard for certain women to embrace a decolonized feminism b/s they are close enough to know what they could gain if everything else is held constant. Perhaps these anxieties, also properly and sometimes offensively satirized by Mad TV during the election, are so deep that we are unable to address them as clearly; hence why neither Mad TV nor this New Yorker cover got much attention.)
The growing differentiation between black people in the earlier examples (suited blacks vs. monkeys, field servants vs. “black politicians”, etc.) also mirrored a growing distinction in racial theory between educated black people and uneducated ones. Moving away from perpetual degeneration to the theory of perfectability it reflected a growing conversation about how far education could take the “negroid turned negro.” The answer, more often than not, continued to be not that far.
Interestingly, these questions solidified around race science, exhibition, and the outspoken condemnation of them from both Booker T Washington and Ida B Wells recreated by this racist offering from Merry Melodie (see right). The cartoon depicts an unnamed African American man going to the zoo and staring at a monkey with similar features to his own in 1939, reminding audiences, you can dress a black man up but you cannot perfect/civilize him. The same sentiment was echoed by the last days of the McCain campaign when Palin trotted out the “two Americas” and the “real Americans.” While her rhetoric had been modified to include liberals, a replacement for the carpetbaggers of DW Griffith and Woodrow Wilson’s world, this criticism centered on the aligning of liberals and black leadership.
Similar images of monkeys or ape-like renderings would dog most black politicians depictions in print from Booker T Washington to Obama. These images included monkeys dressed in modern clothes spouting the famous words of black politicians, otherwise exact renditions of black political leaders with their faces replaced by monkeys or apes or their features exaggerated to mimic apes, as well as images of monkeys disrupting meetings of congress. More recent images included a picture of a pregnant Condi with a monkey in her belly, circulated by Palestinians angry at her lack of response to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and the Obama t-shirts with Obama’s image replaced by Curious George (who by the way has his own pre-existing place in the equation of black people and monkeys/apes since he is a humanlike companion to his colonial safari garbed caretaker, the Man in the Yellow Hat, who brought him from Africa to give him a better life; don’t forget the plot revolves around George being ignorant, incompetent, and foolhardy and in constant need of correction. He has a Mexican counterpart named Memin Pinguin.)
The Police and Black Men
Finally the NY Post is capitalizing on the continued ability of police officers to kill innocent black men without punishment. An ability that is in itself rooted in the race science of inherent black criminality. Not only did three unarmed black men, in three different states, get shot and killed as yet uncharged policemen before the end of the first week of 2009 but the recent riots over the death of Oscar Grant could not have escaped NY Post workers. Grant is only the most recent innocent young black man killed by police for being black in public. The list of innocent black men gunned down is too long for me to recreate here but includes a newly married man in his pajamas on his own property shot b/c he “looked like a suspect” police were chasing, a black immigrant unlocking his apartment door b/c his keys “looked like a weapon,” and a black bachelor on the day before his wedding night b/c his getting into his own car with his fellow party revelers looked like he was “fleeing the scene” of a non-existent crime.
When the NY Post prints a cartoon of a dead monkey lying at the feet of two white police officers, this is the history they draw upon whether wittingly or not. (image to right done by Tatum Charles Gene Jr.)
Conclusion
I know this is a really rough shod run down of the history of science, eugenicism, racism, and image, but I wanted to give a few historically documented places to look for counter arguments to the NY Post so that this does not turn into another “perception is everything” argument. Regardless of whether the images are blatant, like a dead monkey with a caption about a new president or something like the 1862 cartoon to the right which also illustrates real story (the use of monkeys as pickpockets) and a racial narrative involving the police (in which monkey is both a threat to a white woman and soon to be beaten by the billy clubbed cop in the background), the message is consistent and offensive. And more than just offense, it is an argument that has been used to justify real violence throughout N. America’s history.
The bottom line is that as journalists and political cartoonists, the NY Post is well versed on the history I have outlined here. As N. Americans they are familiar with recent events that their cartoon mimics and mocks.
Perhaps most importantly, their supposed humor includes the murdering of the sitting president of the United States. Just because it is not Obama’s body at the feet of those police let us not forget the caption above the cartoon which clearly states:
They’ll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill
There is nothing humorous about murdering the president. There is nothing funny about the invitation to gaze down on the lifeless body of the monkey stand in and laugh.
If you would like to voice your concern to the NY Post, you can contact them using the contact info below:
1211 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10036-8790
(212) 930-8000
1-800-552-7678
Art.
While I have not read your lengthy rebuttal I do not accept your “spin” justification.
Having been around at the time I remember the “Sambos Pancake restaurants” where the title of that chain was found to be offensive.
I experienced integration and segregation when living in NJ and visiting a friend in GA
Let’s not excuse some while blaming others for engaging in the same actions.
This is the end of the thread for myself as I have no desire to continue debating this topic.
“Let’s not excuse some while blaming others for engaging in the same actions.”
False equivalency.
“This is the end of the thread for myself as I have no desire to continue debating this topic.”
Adios!
“This is the end of the thread for myself as I have no desire to continue debating this topic.” Adios!………………. Hmmmmm
You are racist and hater and that is why you are bailing out…. You do not care!
Stanley.
While I cannot speak for your roots I grew up in a mixed black and white neighborhood of Newark NJ and went to Weequahic high school with Alvin Attles former coach of the SF Warriors, the first black NBA coach. We visited with him during halftime when his team was in town playing the Lakers.
Our original next door neighbor in this MV HOA ghetto was a former prize fighter from Chi.
By the way folks his skin was dark black. I took him to see some boxing matches when the Olympics were held in LA (1984).
LG a Racist. Don’t think so.
Larry,
There is no attempt to excuse any one. Both are wrong. My point and the point of others is to point out that while both metaphors are wrong to use, they are also different metaphors. One is to call an individual stupid the other is racist. THEYARE NOT THE SAME.
*Sambo’s? Uncle Remus? The Black Crows in Dumbo? Brown vs. Board of Education? Jim Crow Laws? Busing? The 1964 Civil Rights Act? Hmmm. Davenport probably studied all of those things in very great detail before she created that tasteless print – and then thought it was so terribly funny – that she had to share it with half the Republican party!
In 1956, there was nothing wrong with drinking fountains for different races in Alabama and half of the Uhited States. Today….luckily things have changed a bit. Being overly sensitive
to racist remarks and attitudes is part of today’s ethical make-up – whether you like it or don’t!
Just saying you are not a racist doesn’t mean much. Actions have consequences….they say!
Apologies are also not what they used to be – just ask Lindsay Lohan!
Winning!!!
Wow, they are one of the better sounding protest groups around. That lady especially has a great voice. They have way more organization and rhythm than a tea party protest.
Comparing our president to a chimpanzee isn’t automatically a racist statement. However, if Davenport is really that hateful and thinks black people are genetically inferior and have the mental capacity of a chimpanzee, then I would have to agree with the protesters. However, does anyone have any proof that she hates black people?
She sent the chimp email and defended Grose’s watermelon patch one. If you love black folk, those are two things you don’t do.
The watermelon one seems racially derogatory. However, portraying the president as being from a long line of chimpanzees only seems derogatory. I’ve never met her but she could be racist, or at the very least, insensitive.
Nonsense. Learn some American history.
Learn some common sense and how to be a well adjusted individual in society. Being a perpetual victim might seem attractive at first but it’s not healthy in the long run.
Call me a perpetual victim all you want. It doesn’t help you alleviate your ignorance. Watermelons and apes are the ABC’s of anti-black racism.
So why are so many people, in the wake of this scandal, playing dumb?
Definitely a perpetual victim. Maybe racist as well if you think black people shouldn’t be included in jokes just because they are half black and president of the U.S.A. Definitely racist if you are attacking Davenport just because she is white.
By the way, is it racist to compare Gabriel San Roman to a long family line of chimpanzees? I’m very curious to know what the answer is.
Just for the record, I agreed earlier the White House watermelon patch picture was racially derogatory. However, it’s still not hateful like burning a cross would be.
Definitely a perpetual ignoramus.
Racist apelike depictions of African-Americans is a well documented facet of this nation’s history. There is no difference between that and the watermelon stereotype.
Davenport defended the watermelon patch email. She then followed up with one of her own. Trying to create a false dichotomy doesn’t go very far.
gabriel san roman, having you call me a childish name like that is fine with me. Just goes to show how immature and narrow minded you are. At least I’m not hateful or bitter or racist like yourself. You seem to abuse history to fuel hate to suit your situation.
Why do Jews and Arabs have so many problems? Because there are GSRs over there that abuse history as well to create more hate.
Having said that, I’m not vouching for Davenport since I don’t know her or have proof she does or does not hate black people.
Put it this way, if Obama said he hated white people in a private e-mail to Jesse Jackson or made a racially derogatory joke, I wouldn’t jump to conclusions. And yes, black people do make racially derogatory jokes by the way. I’m sure the president has made some at some point in his life.
JT, as we’re old friends, I wish you would stop pontificating and splitting hairs about what racism is, while talking to non-white people. Their experience and perspective is different from ours. And arguably more valid.
Vern Nelson,
Good point. We are all individuals and have different views of the world.
Hopefully America can move on to a healthier place though. Isn’t that the goal? I don’t know how we will get there but mean hateful actions aren’t going to help. Hating whitey doesn’t help anymore than hating blackey.
“In 1956, there was nothing wrong with drinking fountains for different races in Alabama and half of the Uhited States. Today….luckily things have changed a bit. Being overly sensitive
to racist remarks and attitudes is part of today’s ethical make-up – whether you like it or don’t!”
Larry,
In 1956 it was wrong to have drinking fountains for different races it is why the civil rights act was fought for and passed. Your statement that you perceived/perceive nothing wrong in 1956 is scary.
“Being overly sensitive to racist remarks and attitudes is part of today’s ethical make-up – whether you like it or don’t”
How do you qualify and quantify “overly sensitive”? Who makes the call of “overly sensitive” the racist making the remark or the recipient of the racist remark?
Art. I believe that you are mixing comments . I never said it was OK to have different drinking fountains and bath rooms back in the 50s. If you want to go further back in time we can expand this topic to address slavery including slaves owned by former presidents.
For some calling me a racist shows ignorance. I can provide a list of over 100 African Americans that I am not related to yet have spent a considerable amount of time and energy, without any compensation or desire for same, helping them keep their homes.
“I can provide a list of over 100 African Americans”…….. Hmmmmm
That is all?
“Learn some common sense and how to be a well adjusted individual in society. Being a perpetual victim might seem attractive at first but it’s not healthy in the long run.”
Is having common sense and being a well adjusted individual in society to you mean to do nothing and accept racism when it happens? A little racism is OK , don’t be overly sensitive to a little racism?
Perpetual victim……not, only when it it happens. Better is arguing against perpetual racism. Look at USA history. There has been perpetual racism against Blacks since arriving here. Less now but healthy in some circles.
If you can’t tell the difference between burning a cross on someone’s lawn and laughing along with Dave Chappelle, then yes, you probably have issues.
Although I didn’t find the Obama chimpanzee thing to be funny, I’m sure there were some people that did. Of those people that thought it was funny, I’m sure not all were hateful racist people. I did think the Bush one was kind of funny when it first came out. Wow, does that mean I hate white people? Does it mean a black person that laughs at the Bush chimpanzee thing is racist? I say no, it doesn’t necessarily make you a hateful racist person.
Larry,
This is what you said: “In 1956, there was nothing wrong with drinking fountains for different races in Alabama and half of the Uhited States.”
So what did you really mean?
wow who knew Gilbert was a racist? Sure as heck didn’t see that one coming.
JT,
My point and the point of others is to point out that while both metaphors ,of Bush and Obama,are wrong to use, they are also different metaphors. One is to call an individual stupid the other is racist. THEY ARE NOT THE SAME.
I do not recall Chappelle ever suggesting that blacks stopped short of the Ape evolutionary process compared to whites. Have you heard this humor from Cappelle? He does talk about racism in his monologues to make fun and ridicule racism…….SATIRE.
“Although I didn’t find the Obama chimpanzee thing to be funny, I’m sure there were some people that did. ”
Yes racists did. It is why Davenport tried to keep the E-mail within that group. To them it was funny. She said that she did not send it to those she thought would be offended.
This action clearly indicates she understood the e-mail to be racist.
No one I know that is not hateful and racist thought it was funny.
“If you can’t tell the difference between burning a cross on someone’s lawn and laughing along with Dave Chappelle, then yes, you probably have issues.”
I BELIVE YOU HAVE REAL SEVERE RACIAL ISSUES IF YOU CAN NOT DIFFERENTIATE THE CONTENT AND INTENT BETWEEN YOUR EXAMPLE and associate Davenports e-mail with Chappelle’s humor. You are a scary guy.
“I BELIVE YOU HAVE REAL SEVERE RACIAL ISSUES IF YOU CAN NOT DIFFERENTIATE THE CONTENT AND INTENT BETWEEN YOUR EXAMPLE and associate Davenports e-mail with Chappelle’s humor.”
I think this is part of the reason Dave Chappelle walked away from his show.
Well, I don’t read into the chimpanzee thing what you read into it. I don’t think black people are stupid. At least no more stupid than any other race.
art lomeli, If what you are saying about Davenport is true and she thinks black people are stupid than I would agree she is racist and the joke was mean.
Like I said, I didn’t think it was funny either. However, it’s probably because I voted for the guy. I didn’t like the policies of George W. which is probably why I thought chimpanzee Bush was kind of funny, for a few seconds anyway.
Did you laugh at chimpanzee Bush? Mind if I start calling you racist? Because I’m pretty sure you laughed at it when you first saw it.
art lomeli,
Sorry if that didn’t make sense. I believe burning a cross on someone’s lawn is much different than racial humor. Dave Chappell is actually funny. Davenport, not so much. However, if Davenport made a racist joke that was mean or hateful, it’s still no where near the hate crime you make it out to be.
JT,
” if Davenport made a racist joke that was mean or hateful, it’s still no where near the hate crime you make it out to be.”
I and others have said it is racist. We have not placed a value to it,you have. In your racism value system one form of racism if not confronted can lead to what was common practice at one time in our history……..lynchings!
Davenports’ e-mail is not racial humor,it is racist humor. I understand your agenda is to label it racial humor.
.
JT,
“Did you laugh at chimpanzee Bush? Mind if I start calling you racist? Because I’m pretty sure you laughed at it when you first saw it.”
I have said this a couple of times. It seems you will ignore it no matter what.
Again:
My point and the point of others is to point out that while both metaphors ,of Bush and Obama,are wrong to use, they are also different metaphors. One is to call an individual stupid the other is racist. THEY ARE NOT THE SAME.
You are pretty sure I laughed?? You psychic?
You stay on your agenda of labeling Davenport’s e-mail as humor. Most of us understand your agenda and find it amusing.
art lomeli,
Maybe we just need to agree to disagree. That’s fine.
I’m not psychic by the way. It’s just, when chimpanzee Bush came out it was humorous because I never thought of the president as looking like an ape until I saw the photo. Since you don’t come off as a tea partier, there is a 90 per cent chance you would have laughed.
I actually never thought of Davenport’s e-mail as being funny.
For those that thought it was funny, there are some people like me that aren’t too happy with Obama’s actions as president. I voted for him because he was against the Iraq war and thought we would be out of there by now. He seems just as reckless as George W. Since Obama comes off as being more quick whited than Bush, a turkey probably would have been more appropriate.
JT,
“It’s just, when chimpanzee Bush came out it was humorous because I never thought of the president as looking like an ape until I saw the photo. Since you don’t come off as a tea partier, there is a 90 per cent chance you would have laughed.
Yes we can agree to disagree.
You are right i am not a “tea partier”. I am Republican and voted for W. Bush two times.
I did not find the W. Bush and Obama cartoons funny.