I understand the cartoon, but I find it amazing that the editorial staff of the New Yorker would approve it for a cover. If it ran as a full page political cartoon on the inside with accompanying editorial denouncing the use of idiotic slurs like the “terrorist fist bump” and the implication that Obama in cerimonial African garb was somehow sympathetic to extremists then it would work perfectly to acheive it’s point. As a cover though, it is simply using controversy to sell magazines, pandering to the media to create what the editors know damn well will be a firestorm of outrage both real and manufactured, that in turn will sell more issues.
It’s not funny, it’s pathetic, and the high-brow, supposedly highly educated editors at the magazine should know better.
Yeah, pretty much. It’s not a matter of preferring candidates that don’t buy into religion, and I think that you know that. Every president in the history of this country has been openly Christian, as far as I know, and many of them professed strong religious beliefs, and nobody ever has a problem with it. So why the furor over Islam? From this athiest’s perspective, I don’t see why one is any less palatable than the other.
It’s not allowable to take what a candidate personally believes about men and women’s roles in the universe and use that as part of the process to determine if you want them making and enforcing the policies you’ll have to live by?
It’s absolutely allowable. What specific tenets of Islam make a candidate untenable, in your mind, compared to a Christian candidate?
Slainte and Andrew Mayer: The New Yorker has a long history of satirical political covers; they’ve been pretty brutal to Bush and Cheney in the past. January 22, 2007 has Bush as Nero while Rome Burns, October 8, 2007 has Ahmadinejad confronting a Larry Craig style “wide stance” while in the bathroom, Feb 27, 2006 has Cheney and Bush as Brokeback Mountain cowboys, May 1, 2006 has Rumsfeld as a chained dog outside the white house, Nov 13, 2006 has Bush as an oblivious bull in a china shop. You can see for yourself the covers for 2006 and 2007 - to my eye, this cover just fits with their style - it isn’t a new attempt to be edgy (and edgy? the New Yorker?).
Sarkus: I don’t think either whether Obama or McCain officially find something funny is a measure of whether it succeeds as satire.
Just taking a step back, besides biggotry, which would be denying someone a job or a house or beating someone up because of their race or relligious views. How is it Biggotry to want to evaluate someone’s religious views when voting them for president.
Is it Bigotry if I don’t want a Muslim president because I’m concerned that he would make friends with all the wrong countries and be permissive of terrorism? Could I be concerned that he would not tackle the oil price problem because at it’s root it’s one of the best benefits for poor middle easterners.
Why is it Bigotry to not want to vote for a Muslim but responsible liberal choice if I don’t want a nutball christian who thinks abortion should be illegal and gay people shouldn’t marry?
Well, you also have many mainstream news sources reporting on the controversy now, so I don’t know how far this “par for the course” argument is going to go.
Look, I understand it’s meant to be satire. But that doesn’t mean it works as satire. And if it doesn’t work, then it’s a mistake.
Not knowing Hirsch is like not knowing Jebus Christos, so, yay I passed the “Are you breathing?” part of the test. The second one, wikipedia says he’s a sociologist? Psychologist? Either way, a waste of life, so no.
It isn’t bigotry by definition, though in real terms (i.e. the individual’s reason for voting a particular way) it may be. However, comparing one religion in general to a hardcore fanatic/sectarian version of another (i.e. average Muslim=nutball Christian) is bigotry.
Anyway, I think we’re being a bit unfair to the mainstream voter, since much of this mudslinging isn’t really aimed at them.
Yes, it absolutely would be. For one thing, right in that post you’re making several ghastly assumptions about Muslims.
Why is it Bigotry to not want to vote for a Muslim but responsible liberal choice if I don’t want a nutball christian who thinks abortion should be illegal and gay people shouldn’t marry?
It’s bigotry if you don’t want to vote for someone because of parts of their background or belief system that are unrelated to the office for which they’re running. It’s not bigotry if you don’t want to vote for someone because they have religious views that you strongly disagree with that they also want to impose on you with the force of law. This applies equally to candidates of all religions.
Is it Bigotry if I don’t want a Muslim president because I’m concerned that he would make friends with all the wrong countries and be permissive of terrorism?
And that would be different to the last 50 years, at least, of Christian Presidents how exactly?
Our bosom buddies in Saudi Arabia are promoting about a hardline, radical, supportive of Terrorism on the “non believer” Islam as you can get.
And in terms of making friends with other “wrong countries”, how long have you got?
Yup, that they do, and some of them are even funny. However, none of the examples you mentioned, nor others I have seen in the past, were targeted in the way this one is. Showing Rumsfeld as a chained dog isn’t a response to people claiming Bush actually chains the man outside on the White House lawn, and showing Bush/Cheney as gay cowboys isn’t playing on rumors that the two have romantic liasons at the Bush family ranch. This Obama cartoon plays on all they rumors, fears and misinformation that has been fed to the American public for the last 24 months about the man, and tossing it on the cover is a decision that anyone with half a brain can predict will cause outrage and controversy in a way that no simple “let’s show Bush as Nero while Rome burns” cartoon could ever do.
It was a cheap move, plain and simple, and they’re getting exactly what they wanted out of it, tons of public exposure and higher sales.
On the flip side, it appears that the whole thing might actually be helping Obama a little. News organizations are bending over backwards today to have on guests who are saying over and over again how everything depicted in the cartoon is a total fabrication, which in the end may help dispell the misinformation far better than the campaign could ever hope to on it’s own.
Yeah, this thing sure has made a lot of people angry (or faux-angry) for having pretty much no downside for anyone. Media gets to totally overblow it, New Yorker gets a ton of publicity, and Obama and McCain get to call the cover offensive.
Something tells me that, say, Nixon, Kennedy, and Clinton were not all that particularly devout.
So you can be a non-devout practicising christian and that’s ok, but if you’re Muslim you must be a frothing Wahhabist hell bent on global terrorism and the re-imposition of the Ottoman Empire/Caliphate based out of Washington?
Hell, Kennedy was Catholic, his first loyalty was to the Pope and the Vatican, country comes second.
I think the controversy is overblown, its not like the New Yorker is on the 7-11 shelves in Dumbfuck, OH anyway. Its more of a reflection of how the editors of a lefty cultcha and litratcha magazine think of anyone dumb enough to fall for the rumors/smears about Obama. I harbor a lot of the same bias so maybe I’m not the best judge of this.
The interesting part of this whole manufactured story is that ultimately, it probably helps Obama. Like Jesse Jackson’s exressed desire to geld Obama, it allows him to criticise members of his base (in Jackson’s case, super easy due to his irrelevance and the crudity of his remarks, and in the New Yorker’s case cause it does appear to be unfair to him and his wife) without alienating any of them.
The GOP is going to find Obama very hard to attack, along their traditional lines, in the General.
I think Islam holds its followers to a higher standard than Christianity does. I know several Christians who basically go to church on Sunday and that’s that. I’ve never met a Muslim who was not at least about 10x more committed to the religion than that.
Good strawman with the fundamentalist extremist tact. How you connected me saying that Muslims are more devout in general than Christians to me saying Muslims = fundamentalist extremists is interesting. Do you think that being a devout Muslim must mean being a fundamental extremist? Is that really what that means to you?
And again with equating race with religion. One is a conscious choice, the other is not.
