TweetyV6 said:

ThatWhiteDude said:

TweetyV6 said:

And yet you do.

Speaking Out against racism is Not speaking for black people.

What is your drive to do so?

EmmaMcG said:

ThatWhiteDude said:

^^No, it's not our fault, nobody claims that. But white people have the responsibility to aknowledge that part of their history and to make it better, isn't it funny? We got all these history books, documentaries etc and still there are people who are blind when it comes to racism. And it's very telling that it is white people who try to tell black people that the serena comic is not racist. This is like a man telling a woman when rape is rape, taking the power away from her and then say she's just too damn sensitive. No, it's her body so stfu. As for the comic, it is racist and I can clearly see why black people feel offended.

I don't want to join the debate about whether or not the drawing is racist, but for what it's worth, not every black person sees it as being so. A former colleague of mine said she thought it was "hilarious" and my ex boyfriend found it neither funny nor offensive. In fact, he was more bothered about Serena's attitude on the court than the drawing of her. He is, after all, a big fan of hers and felt ashamed to admit that after her behaviour. Personally, I don't think we can say definitively whether the drawing was racist or not because its only a drawing. We'd have to know the thought process of the artist who drew it. Was it his intent to degrade all black people or was he merely exaggerating one person's physical features? I don't know. And when it comes to matters of racism, I believe intent is everything. Therefore I would not be comfortable with passing judgment one way or the other.

About 'intent' I think Mark Knight's visible shock https://www.youtube.com/w...rDQ_tBfUBE in the face of the - social and other - media's overreaction to his cartoon pretty much says it all.

toejam said:

The Washington Post article by Michael Cavna is not very persuasive in making the case that the cartoon is racist. Cavna tries to make the argument with the following points:

.

Knight depicts the 23-time Grand Slam champion as a pacifier-sucking young child throwing a tantrum. The umpire says to eventual champion Naomi Osaka: “Can you just let her win?” In doing so, Knight draws facial features reflecting the dehumanizing Jim Crow caricatures so common in the 19th and 20th centuries. Knight’s cartoon conjures up a range of such caricatures that were branded on memorabilia and popularized on stage and screen of the era...

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Cavna acknowledges that Serena is depicted in a way that is supposed to remind one of a child throwing a tantrum. Serena has big features in real life. These factors alone explains her unflattering depiction. It's an apt metaphor. Serena acted like a child throwing a tantrum, so she is portrayed as a child throwing a tantrum - spitting out a dummy, stomping her feet, and crying with a wide open mouth and crocodile tears. It is not supposed to be a comment on black people being inferior to non-blacks. Any perceived "conjuring" of Jim Crow-era features need not be intended or necessary and I suspect is brought to the image by those prone to see "racism" where it's not actually there.

.

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Note the way Cavna doesn't personally commit himself to this point, carefully inserting that it's what "some critics say". I suspect he doesn't commit because he knows it's not all that strong. I have already demonstrated in this thread that Naomi is not portrayed as a "small white woman". Her skin tone is depicted significantly darker than the "white" chair umpire. Just about every colour in the cartoon - from skin tones, to clothes, to the sea of crowd, to Serena's green racket, to the blue court - are lighter than they were in real life. Naomi is "small" because she is in the background. Indeed, with perspective taken into account, she's actually taller than she probably would be in real life! She is not a "faceless prop" (to quote Cavna's reputable source, celebrity children's author J.K. Rowling's twitter comment). The point of Naomi being in the background is more likely to say that her gallant victory has been unfairly overshadowed by the tantrum-throwing Serena. This has nothing to do with gender or race. It has everything to do with Serena's poor behaviour.

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In early August, for a cartoon about train-safety in the Australian state of Victoria, Knight also faced ire for how he drew faceless black figures fighting in the background

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The cartoon in question was commenting on a series of actual incidents involving African gangs in Victorian train stations. The major TARGET of the cartoon, the one being lampooned, was a white politician and her (perceived) weak handling of the situation. This also strikes me as Cavna cherry-picking Knight's cartoons to suit his argument and ignoring others that go against it. For example, Cavna failed to mention Knight's recent cartoon that positively depicted "person of colour" Aretha Franklin upon her passing, nor his cartoon from only a few days before the now infamous Serena one that also depicted an Australian tennis star, male non-African Nick Kyrgios, as a child-like brat for his poor behaviour on the tennis court. By not mentioning such cartoons, Cavna's audience misses out on an awful lot of information needed to put the Serena cartoon in its proper context.

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[Edited 9/24/18 1:34am]

Thank you for covering all points with such clarity toejam. What more can be said really...

TweetyV6 said:

PurpleSkipper58 said:

TweetyV6 said:

Dude. You're the one labeling me racist by proxy. Oh wait, even Nazi. Who's dumb here?
Have you ever seen me approve racism? I mean REAL racism, not percieved racism in a cartoon.

As a kid, I have been subject to a kind of racism (since belonging to a certain nationality nowadays is being labeled racism too) I'd rather call it bullied.
I have been (severely) beaten, spit on and made fun of in the period I was 6-12yrs old. It stoped when I outgrew my class mates (I was in puberty early, had to shave when I was 13) and switched to high school when I was 13.
I decided for myself not to be offended anymore about what was said about me, or my kind. That made life much easier.

Oh and regarding you calling me dumb... see you at our next Mensa meeting? Or rather not?
The 2nd, I guess.

Oh Tweety, don’t you know that ‘White people can’t experience racism’ because ‘prejudice + power = racism’? You’re just gonna have to deal with people of other races bullying you, because your ancestors may or may not have done some fucked up shit. Sorry. You’re gonna have to get use to people being racist towards you, think of it as “payback”. I’m sure they think of it that way

Kinda sucks when the chickens come home to roost. Poor little snowflakes. Womp Womp........

CherryMoon57 said:

toejam said:

Thank you for covering all points with such clarity toejam. What more can be said really...

.

I assume you are being sarcastic?

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This is just the normal toejam edit and miss the point post.

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Note he edits out "Knight’s cartoon conjures up a range of such caricatures that were branded on memorabilia and popularized on stage and screen of the era, including the minstrel-show character Topsy born out of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” as well as the title character in 1899’s “Little Black Sambo.” " Why? Because this is the argument everyone else has been making here and toejam needed to pretend no one has been answering him satisafactorily. Because, obviously, a lone far-right white male from Australia's "Deep North" is the person that is responsible for determining whether a depiction of a person not of his race, country, gender etc etc is racist. By shortening this sentence, he can make it seem that the baby depiction part of caricature is all that should be seen. It is not.

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He uses the same edit trick again in his attempt to dismiss comments about Naomi's depiction by getting you to disregard them because the author does not stand by them because he says "some critics say..." The reason for the "..." is Cavna goes on to immediately quote one of these critics: "Author J.K. Rowling wrote on Twitter: “Well done on reducing one of the greatest sportswomen alive to racist and sexist tropes and turning a second great sportswoman into a faceless prop.”" Hardly a backtrack. It is consistent with the whole article as it is not an op ed, it is a summary of what others are saying. Toejam, himself, saw Japanese racial stereotyping in Naomi merely standing up (despite this being nothing of the sort and Naomi is Haitian-Japanese). His skin colour assessment asks us to believe all whites are always drawn using the same shade and blonde hair all over is accurate enough despite Naomi's hair being mainly very dark.

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The worst part of toejam's clarity is that, yes, it does display clarity of the type of assessment being made. Nick Kyrgios (an Australian with Malaysian and Greek parents) has been depicted disparagingly for his rants. The difference is he is less exaggerated and not in a racist way that draws directly on the type of depictions mentioned in the WP article that toejam edited out with his first "...". It is a caricature that does not cross the line to being racist.

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This clarity of assessment is exacerbated by toejam discussing Knight's previous controversial racist depiction. For those outside of Australia, there was a far-right beat up and race based scare campaign promoted by certain media outlets like Sky News and the Herald Sun in Melbourne. As discussed above, the Herald Sun (including Knight) panders to their audience and they were promoting the idea that there is a more serious black gang violence problem in Melbourne than there really is. Kenyan and South Sudanese born gang violence exists in Melbourne, no question. However, you are 25 times more likely to be violently assaulted by an Australian or New Zealand born person. Kenyan and South Sudanese people make up a very small portion of the population. They are generally refugees. Gang violence by these refugees is broadly in proportion with similar age and economic condition groups in Melbourne. The cartoon was promoting the idea that the lampooned politician was hiding the threat of gang violence - Shown solely as by black faceless youth and not the actual mix that would show it being done by mostly white youth. Hardly such a convincing defence of the political cartoonist leaving nothing more to say.

^Sorry to disappoint you Ian, but there was absolutely no sarcasm in my post to toejam.

CherryMoon57 said:

^Sorry to disappoint you Ian, but there was absolutely no sarcasm in my post to toejam.

.

No problem, that is what I figured anyway. I was just giving you the opportunity to reconsider you opinion that toejam's post was 'drop the mike' good.

TweetyV6 said:

ThatWhiteDude said:

TweetyV6 said:

What is your drive to do so?

Because I hate racism, I could give you a way deeper answer, but you don't give a fuck anyway and I'm not wasting my time with it Just for you to say: "They didn't ask you to speak for them". Because this is your argument to go If you have nothing else against me.

I don't have anything against you at all. I don't know you in person.
We disagree. Heavily. And I have an opinion about you because of what you write.

I guess if we meet, have a beer, we'd have a better conversation then on a webbased forum.

IanRG said:

CherryMoon57 said:

^Sorry to disappoint you Ian, but there was absolutely no sarcasm in my post to toejam.

.

No problem, that is what I figured anyway. I was just giving you the opportunity to reconsider you opinion that toejam's post was 'drop the mike' good.

At least he doesn't overinterpret a cartoon through a biased racial lense. As for your reference to Mark's other drawing, I thought it was pretty obvious that Knight and many other cartoonists tend to draw people who are a certain distance away (or not famous enough to appear at the front) without any precise facial features, regardless of their skin colour.

My view is that the commercially popular JK Rowling said her piece and everyone blindly followed her lead.

CherryMoon57 said:

IanRG said:

.

No problem, that is what I figured anyway. I was just giving you the opportunity to reconsider you opinion that toejam's post was 'drop the mike' good.

At least he doesn't overinterpret a cartoon through a biased racial lense. As for your reference to Mark's other drawing, I thought it was pretty obvious that Knight and many other cartoonists tend to draw people who are a certain distance away (or not famous enough to appear at the front) without any precise facial features, regardless of their skin colour.

My view is that the commercially popular JK Rowling said her piece and everyone blindly followed her lead.

.

On the contrary, that is exactly what toejam is doing one way or the other - He associates clearly racist depictions of African Americans as nothing more exaggerations of reality whilst overinterpreting a person standing up to talk to a Ref high up on a chair as a "a typically 'Japanese' pose and demeanor" - His very words. He went so far in his over-interpretation to create a picture so he could argue that the lightly tanned white blonde woman was supposed to be quite dark skinned and dark haired (except for the dyed bottom part of her ponytail) Naomi Osaka.

.

That the group of clearly black people are faceless is irrelevant - the political agenda of Herald Sun and its political cartoonist, Knight, was to promote a scare campaign against refugees by overemphasising violence by some Kenyan and South Sudan born people in Melbourne - when the vast majority of street violence in Melbourne is by Australians and New Zealanders. This is a far right agenda - in my area the New South Wales sister publication to the Herald Sun helped support and promote people to travel to my area from Sydney to protest a Mosque being built here because few here were concerned. They did the same when South Sudanese refugees were being placed in my area, again with little local concern.

.

To borrow from another argumentative tennis player - you can't be serious that all of us are just blindly following JK Rowling. Not a fan of her, or her books and I did not know what she said till after I saw the political cartoon and did not need to know what she said to recognise it as racist.

IanRG said:

IanRG said:

CherryMoon57 said:

At least he doesn't overinterpret a cartoon through a biased racial lense. As for your reference to Mark's other drawing, I thought it was pretty obvious that Knight and many other cartoonists tend to draw people who are a certain distance away (or not famous enough to appear at the front) without any precise facial features, regardless of their skin colour.

My view is that the commercially popular JK Rowling said her piece and everyone blindly followed her lead.

.

On the contrary, that is exactly what toejam is doing one way or the other - He associates clearly racist depictions of African Americans as nothing more exaggerations of reality whilst overinterpreting a person standing up to talk to a Ref high up on a chair as a "a typically 'Japanese' pose and demeanor" - His very words. He went so far in his over-interpretation to create a picture so he could argue that the lightly tanned white blonde woman was supposed to be quite dark skinned and dark haired (except for the dyed bottom part of her ponytail) Naomi Osaka.

.

That the group of clearly black people are faceless is irrelevant - the political agenda of Herald Sun and its political cartoonist, Knight, was to promote a scare campaign against refugees by overemphasising violence by some Kenyan and South Sudan born people in Melbourne - when the vast majority of street violence in Melbourne is by Australians and New Zealanders. This is a far right agenda - in my area the New South Wales sister publication to the Herald Sun helped support and promote people to travel to my area from Sydney to protest a Mosque being built here because few here were concerned. They did the same when South Sudanese refugees were being placed in my area, again with little local concern.

.

To borrow from another argumentative tennis player - you can't be serious that all of us are just blindly following JK Rowling. Not a fan of her, or her books and I did not know what she said till after I saw the political cartoon and did not need to know what she said to recognise it as racist.

Nothing is 'clearly' racist in the cartoon and toejam has already demonstrated that. If it were, there would actually be no need for a debate at all. The way toejam referred to Naomi's depiction was just in line with the traditional sentiment that Japanese people are a very polite nation, a positive and passing comment that came as part of a whole response so does not really constitute a 'racist' stereotype (more of a cultural one).

But anyway, since the majority had already allowed themselves to see a stereotype in Serena's depiction why should the mere mention of a possible cultural stereotype drawn through another character be immediately criticised? There clearly is an ambiguity in the way people generally feel towards various ethnic groups and I thing the debate here reflects this.

For me this kind of unecessary fuss over a simple cartoon is not going to help racism disappear, on the contrary, I think it promotes it. Who knows, it may have influenced some people who would have not have yet acquired a racist mindset, to now actually view things in a more racist way.

As for the mentioned agenda, I am neither aware nor convinced about it. Can you please provide some sources? My feeling overall based on your responses on this thread, is that you (and others) are clutching at straws, and quoting an unrelated celebrity in support of a weak argument is not going to make it any more convincing.

First of all TweetyV6 it is called a mosque, not a mosk. Getting that wrong makes you look ignorant.

.

Rest of you - stop all this sniping - this is the prince.org not SJW vs the Free Speech Mob, let us live Prince's mantra - LOVE4ONEANOTHER. It starts by loving the next person u r verbally sparring with over some celebrity sportsperson bullshit.

.

"Love vs Hate, Love will always win" - TAFKAP Quote on the single cover of I hate U.

CherryMoon57 said:

IanRG said:

.

On the contrary, that is exactly what toejam is doing one way or the other - He associates clearly racist depictions of African Americans as nothing more exaggerations of reality whilst overinterpreting a person standing up to talk to a Ref high up on a chair as a "a typically 'Japanese' pose and demeanor" - His very words. He went so far in his over-interpretation to create a picture so he could argue that the lightly tanned white blonde woman was supposed to be quite dark skinned and dark haired (except for the dyed bottom part of her ponytail) Naomi Osaka.

.

That the group of clearly black people are faceless is irrelevant - the political agenda of Herald Sun and its political cartoonist, Knight, was to promote a scare campaign against refugees by overemphasising violence by some Kenyan and South Sudan born people in Melbourne - when the vast majority of street violence in Melbourne is by Australians and New Zealanders. This is a far right agenda - in my area the New South Wales sister publication to the Herald Sun helped support and promote people to travel to my area from Sydney to protest a Mosque being built here because few here were concerned. They did the same when South Sudanese refugees were being placed in my area, again with little local concern.

.

To borrow from another argumentative tennis player - you can't be serious that all of us are just blindly following JK Rowling. Not a fan of her, or her books and I did not know what she said till after I saw the political cartoon and did not need to know what she said to recognise it as racist.

Nothing is 'clearly' racist in the cartoon and toejam has already demonstrated that. If it were, there would actually be no need for a debate at all. The way toejam referred to Naomi's depiction was just in line with the traditional sentiment that Japanese people are a very polite nation, a positive and passing comment that came as part of a whole response so does not really constitute a 'racist' stereotype (more of a cultural one).

But anyway, since the majority had already allowed themselves to see a stereotype in Serena's depiction why should the mere mention of a possible cultural stereotype drawn through another character be immediately criticised? There clearly is an ambiguity in the way people generally feel towards various ethnic groups and I thing the debate here reflects this.

For me this kind of unecessary fuss over a simple cartoon is not going to help racism disappear, on the contrary, I think it promotes it. Who knows, it may have influenced some people who would have not have yet acquired a racist mindset, to now actually view things in a more racist way.

As for the mentioned agenda, I am neither aware nor convinced about it. Can you please provide some sources? My feeling overall based on your responses on this thread, is that you (and others) are clutching at straws, and quoting an unrelated celebrity in support of a weak argument is not going to make it any more convincing.

.

Nothing in the stated opinion (it was not a demonstration) showed that the political cartoon was not clearly racist - This is just confirmational bias: you agree with a person, so their arguments are drop the mike moments to you. The way Naomi Osaka was referred to in the opinion is stereotyping based on her assumed (but half incorrect) race/culture, just as the way Serena was drawn is stereotyping her based on her race/culture. Yes, Naomi (drawn as a lightly tanned white, blonde woman) was shown positively whilst Serena (drawn in line with a long history of racist depictions of black women in western culture) was shown negatively. Seeking to create a differentiation between sterotyping by race vs stereotyping by culture avoids the issue is neither here nor there. Importantly Nick was not racially stereotyped by Knight when he was shown negatively.

.

You miss my point, but in doing so agree with me: I was responding to you saying there was no overinterpretation through a biased racial lense on your side. I showed that there was, and you are now saying well OK but that should not be immediately criticised.

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Racism is not going away and it certainly is not going to go away if everyone offended by the apparent racism in a simple cartoon just shuts up and looks away lest their stand against racism encourages more racism!

.

That you, as a person not from Australia, are unaware of a particular Australian Murdoch publication's agenda is not my concern. That you are not aware of Murdoch's political agenda in media world-wide is not believable. As a person from the UK, you should be well aware of the political agendas of the different publications in your country - the same applies to other countries.

.

You are being too dismissive of other's opinions and you are basing it on an already disputed false claim. I am not reliant at all on quoting JK Rowling, I just pointed out that toejam's post wrongly criticised an article about opinions expressed through the media about the political cartoon and cartoonist because, in discussing these opinions, the author said some of these argue ... . It is mere coincidence that the quote immediately following the "..." was from Rowling. Had I started with JK Rowling said ..., then you may have had an amazingly weak point, but I have many more straws in my hand than you have.

[Edited 9/25/18 14:24pm]

Purplegarden said:

First of all TweetyV6 it is called a mosque, not a mosk. Getting that wrong makes you look ignorant.

.

Rest of you - stop all this sniping - this is the prince.org not SJW vs the Free Speech Mob, let us live Prince's mantra - LOVE4ONEANOTHER. It starts by loving the next person u r verbally sparring with over some celebrity sportsperson bullshit.

.

"Love vs Hate, Love will always win" - TAFKAP Quote on the single cover of I hate U.

.

Throughout Prince's life and music, he also regularly encouraged us to show LOVE4ONEANOTHER by standing up for what is right and against assumptions and generalisations based on racism etc.

.

Discourse on contentious issues is not something Prince shied away from.

Maybe - but the tone of the past 2 pages has got very ugly and personal. I am all for debate and standing up for justice and respect, but there are limits.

Purplegarden said:

Maybe - but the tone of the past 2 pages has got very ugly and personal. I am all for debate and standing up for justice and respect, but there are limits.

.

By no means is this the worst thread where this is currently occuring - but I am all for toning down. The thread is arguably past its end anyway.

Purplegarden said:

First of all TweetyV6 it is called a mosque, not a mosk. Getting that wrong makes you look ignorant.

.

Look at the p.s. in my signature.
And... ask me if I care, you "taalnazi" (which is a Dutch[one of my 2 native languages] expression for people attending other people on spelling errors; language-nazi)

TweetyV6 said:

Purplegarden said:

First of all TweetyV6 it is called a mosque, not a mosk. Getting that wrong makes you look ignorant.

.

Look at the p.s. in my signature.
And... ask me if I care, you "taalnazi" (which is a Dutch[one of my 2 native languages] expression for people attending other people on spelling errors; language-nazi)

Well I have two words for you in my native language (Maori) and will not bother to translate them

Tutaeupoko and Pohokohua!

.

I thought the Dutch were open minded, are you Afrikaner? I mean you guys tolerate dope and prostitutes - thats forward (And fxxking daft).

.

Anyway you are the main shit stirrer. Even Serena has moved on, maybe we all should too - Ka haere koe kua mutu te korero.

[Edited 9/26/18 1:18am]

Purplegarden said:

.

I thought the Dutch were open minded, are you Afrikaner? I mean you guys tolerate dope and prostitutes - thats forward (And fxxking daft)

Kind of.

On paper I'm Djurman
In my heart I'm Dutch.

Born, raised, educated & working in the Netherlands, moved to Djurmanie 10 yrs ago, working in Germany since the beginning of this year.

And yes, the Dutch are very relaxed, open minded & liberal. Much more then the Germans.
I miss the Dutch working mentality. You can say to your boss in his/her face that he/she is a dick and have a coffee afterwards and laugh about it.

The drugs & prostitues are for tourists.

free2bFreeda2 said:

brb with related comment 👀 [Edited 9/26/18 13:50pm]

Her response when asked about the broken racquet (6:30) is priceless.

[Edited 9/26/18 14:21pm]

CherryMoon57 said: