Letters to the Times

[mirrorshard]

If you haven't seen this appallingly racist cartoon in the Times, I recommend it for sheer did-they-actually-publish-that value.

Edit: please read the comments before leaving "helpful" corrections. If someone else has already said it, I don't need a "me too". Thank you.

I can't find an address specifically for complaints; comment@thetimes.co.uk gets autorejected. I've sent the following to online.editor@timesonline.co.uk as the apparent next most appropriate thing.



Sir,

I should like to register a complaint about Peter Brookes' cartoon dated 21st March 2009. It clearly depicts Barack Obama as a coconut, which is of course a strong racial slur - a derogatory term meaning "black on the outside, white on the inside".

I am disappointed that a respectable newspaper would publish such slurs, and further disappointed that a respectable newspaper can find nothing better to say about a prominent world leader so soon after his election than to comment on his race.

Yours sincerely,
mirrorshard

Comments

[ashfae.livejournal.com]

Which is to say that what they intended doesn't matter in the slightest; it's how it's read that matters.

I'm sorry, but I must passionately disagree with this. Intentions count for a lot and should be respected. Verify them by all means, but credit them. Also, if "it's how it's read that matters," the implication is that if even one person is offended, then the original should be eradicated. But it is IMPOSSIBLE to some up with anything that someone won't find offensive.

I saw your comment below about it being the creator's responsibility to be clear about meaning. But the reader has responsibilities as well.

(admittedly, I looked at the cartoon, wondered why Obama had been drawn as a bowling ball, and just didn't get it because I was unaware of the bowling gaff; the coconut thing did not occur to me at all, and I still think it's very unlikely to have been intended)

[ashfae.livejournal.com]

(I have a long long history of battling censorship and very strong beliefs about the importance of being an intelligent reader; apologies if I was rude)

[friend-of-tofu.livejournal.com]

Snap. This.

That said, I think the cartoon is fairly stupid and unfunny. I *did* think it was a bowling ball, but this is hardly a funny way of approaching the bowling ball gaffe. Which, as cjwatson observed, merits criticism.

It seems quite rubbish on all sides, but I really can't see this as jaw-droppingly offensive. A bit dubious, yes indeed.