Drawing a bead on Obama
Deaglán de Bréadún
There’s a row going on in the ‘States about an anti-Obama cartoon featuring a monkey. I have to say I find it quite offensive. See for yourself by clicking here.
We Irish have long experience of being portrayed in Simian terms. Take all those Punch cartoons in the 19th century. There were some more recent ones although they usually focused on what the late Lord Hailsham called “the baboons of the IRA”.
On the other hand, I don’t find the New Yorker cartoon, which also features on the link given in my first paragraph above, at all offensive. It is so over-the-top that it actually makes a pro-Obama point by showing how ludicrous it was to portray him as somehow sympathetic to Islamic terrorism. Or is that just me being a middle-class sophisticate? (Okay, working-class sophisticate if you like.)
The New York Post would not be considered on the left or liberal side of the spectrum. Every right-winger in the Big Apple will know what message this cartoon is sending out.
Having said that, I found the cartoon portrayals of Bush in the Guardian bordering on offensive too.
