The editorial cartoon has a long history of walking the line between provocation and unacceptable offensiveness, and often falls right over the edge. It happened twice on the same bloody day last week, when an Australian newspaper and the Otago Daily Times both published cartoons that were downright racist.
The Australian situation was by far the worst example, with the Herald Sun doubling down on its stupidity and bleating that its depiction of tennis star Serena William's on-court meltdown was not anything special, because they exaggerated the features of everybody, apparently trying to prove this odious point by reprinting the offensive cartoon alongside other caricatures.
Their argument that the cartoon was fine if you ignored all the sociological and historical context behind that kind of depiction was downright fucking bizarre, because the whole fucking point of editorial cartoons is that they acknowledge the sociological and historical perspectives of any subject they tackle. And anybody who defends that depiction needs to open a fucking history book to see how people of African descent have been portrayed and treated in the past, and how the Herald Sun's cartoon comes after centuries of disgusting propaganda.
Meanwhile, not to be outdone on stupidity, the Otago Daily Times published a cartoon that implied that learning te reo Māori would make kids dumber.
Leaving aside the fact that numerous studies show that learning any language makes you smarter rather than stupider, it was blatant dog-whistling during te reo week, and reeked of a fear that white people might be forced to learn something they don't want to learn. It didn't make any grand point, or continue the debate, it just threw some more unwanted dumb into the mix.
Individual cartoonists go over the line, and may not have the proper perspective. Most get it right, and realise that punching down just makes you look like a fucking jerk, not a truth-teller. There are many good artists out there who figured this out long ago, such as the NZ Herald's Rod Emmerson (who also happens to be one of the very best caricaturists in the entire global industry) but even the best sometimes step right over the racism line, even without realising it.
(Although it was pretty disappointing to see Emmerson on the TV news blaming the Twitter mob for all the fuss over the Herald Sun, as if you need to be a regular tweeter to recognise racism when you see it.)
But the most disappointing thing about these stupid cartoons isn't just that these artists had a brain fart (and some of them have a lot), it's that these cartoons then go through multiple editorial eyes before getting on the page, and they all thought this was fine. Even though you can bet there are many, many people in the newsrooms who thought those cartoons were just as bone-stupid as everybody else did, the ones who had the power to send the dumbarse idea for a cartoon back to the artist all thought it was acceptable.
Cartoons should be provocative, and can be used to expose abuses of power, incompetence and sheer evil. Artists like the legendary David Low took principled stands that history has rewarded. But the type of cartoons seen last week will go down on the wrong side of history and more people in the newsroom need to be aware of this, not just the reporters who are surprised to see their stories alongside it.
- Ron Troupe
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