A distasteful cartoon
Two blogs have already commented on this cartoon by Trace Hodgson in the Herald on Sunday. They’re Hitting Metal and http://www.whaleoil.co.nz/node/3627.
The premise of the cartoon is fine, comparing a political party to a gang.
The Nazi swastika on the helmet is grossly offensive to both National supporters and those who fought or died in WWII. The cartoonist made a deliberate choice to include the swastika when the cartoon would have worked without it, so one can only presume he intends some significance by it.
Finally there is the suggestion that the portrayal of John Key is anti-semitic. Key is not Jewish in a religious sense, but as his mother was Jewish he is considered by some to be “technically Jewish”. I suspect such a label irritates him but the media have often focused on it, so it is relatively well known now.
Is Hodgson’s caricature anti-semitic? On the one hand Hodgson is known for doing offensive caricatures of almost all his subjects. That is his trademark. But on the other hand the massive nose, glowing eyes and fanged teeth seem to lie uncomfortably close to the traditional anti-semitic portrayal of the “devilish Jew” as described here.
At the end of the day I can’t conclude one way or another. The glowing eyes add little to the cartoon except to make Key look demonic, but it may just be artistic licence.
What definitely was over the top though is the portrayal of the Nazi swastika. The Herald on Sunday may wish to consider how comfortable it is with such a portrayal – even in cartoons.
February 5th, 2007 at 10:56 am
But portraying Helen Clark as a lesbian Darth Vader is fine?
If John Key is going to make such a big deal of his past “from State Housing to Millionaire”; then he doesn’t get to pick and choose what aspects of his life are focussed on.
And as for the Swastika, yeah too far, but what price free speech in satire?
February 5th, 2007 at 11:21 am
Darth Vader isn’t actually a race there David C.
Gross anti-Semitism is racist.
Given that Helen Clark was very outspoken against such racial based satire during the Mohomad cartoon hysteria then where does she stand on this?
You can put this cartoon along side any from the Simon Wiesenthal centers archives or the modern Islamic media anti-Semitic cartoons and not seen any difference.
And finally, why are you claiming Key is picking and choosing? To the best of my knowledge he or his office have yet to make any comment. Did he give you a call or are you just psycic?
February 5th, 2007 at 11:41 am
I wonder how Black Power feel about their fist insignia being ripped off?
February 5th, 2007 at 11:43 am
Compare and contrast
http://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2006/02/muhammad_cartoons.html
February 5th, 2007 at 12:00 pm
I agree it is offensive DPF but who’s embassy do we burn down?
February 5th, 2007 at 12:03 pm
Yet another example of the narrow minded leftist concepts that are always to the fore in the mainstream media..
February 5th, 2007 at 12:13 pm
Please, David, your crocodile tears are not worthy of you.
Let’s see….maybe Hodgson used a Swastika because that’s exactly what some gangs employ as insignia. You didn’t think of that, eh?
I agree that Key’s nose is a little odd but then caricature can be like that. Maybe Hodgson thinks Key has got a big snozz. But anti-semetic? Trying taking that patch off your eye.
February 5th, 2007 at 12:14 pm
One way you could look at it, is that it’s an inclusive gang, on the one hand you have your nazi swastika wearing gang member but yet there’s a jewish leader. Isn’t it nice to see them all get along?
Besides, it’s not made blantantly clear that we are attacking Mr Key’s Judaism (and I don’t care what you deny, if your mother’s vagina is jewish, you’re jewish, it may be arbitrary but it’s the rule, I know because I’m the a jew too), cartoonists often highlight a person’s minor physical points.
And anyway, if it is it’s about time we had some good ol’ fashioned anti-semitic cartoonery. The last fella who tried it got fired from the Herald if I remember correctly.
February 5th, 2007 at 12:16 pm
I don’t think the swastika is over the top at all, the Mongrel Mob use it in their imagery all the time. It just strengthens the gang/party link. The shylock thing? I’m not so sure about that. Does John Key have a bit of a horn on him? If so, he’s just being charicatured (sp?) like Helen Clark and her wonky teeth. Obviously the combination is a bit suspect, but hey….Aren’t you lot supposed to be “anti-PC”?
February 5th, 2007 at 12:21 pm
http://media.apn.co.nz/webcontent/image/jpg/8DonBrash.jpg
That’s a fairly big nose.
February 5th, 2007 at 12:25 pm
GPT: whose embassy do we burn down?
No no, GPT, if we’re modelling ourselves on the Islamofascists we let the cartoon be published without a murmer and then a whole year later when some bearded looney rides into town and tells us to be offended, that’s when we start with the burnin’ and the hollerin’ and the beatin’.
Because, like, when it first appeared we were… ummm… busy getting outraged about something that happened the previous year. Yeah, that’s it.
February 5th, 2007 at 12:48 pm
The cartoon seems pretty accurate to me.
February 5th, 2007 at 1:15 pm
Sorry, I must be blind. Where is the swastika?
February 5th, 2007 at 1:16 pm
On Bill English’s helmet.
February 5th, 2007 at 1:19 pm
Remember all this Lefty “live and let live” sweetness guys….it will be usefull for when they go mad over some rightist slight in the future.
February 5th, 2007 at 1:34 pm
David C is right. Darth Vader is owed an apology from the Young Nats. I also note that David C thinks anything is fair game on John Key because he had a life story that David C doesn’t like.
Sonic as usual shows no sense of proportion as he compares mass killings and death threat about one cartoon, to a blog post pointing out ssomething is offensive.
And finally we have Tom S saying he approves and by association does think the Nats are Nazis. This of course say far far more about TomS than it does on anyone else.
February 5th, 2007 at 1:35 pm
Isnt it Bill English who is wearing the ‘stormtrooper’ helmet with the swastika.
But hes a catholic so its OK to make any innuendo here
February 5th, 2007 at 1:43 pm
Farrar, Farrar, Farrar, whilst I acknowledge you are a man of reasonable intellect, you have misunderstood my post, at no stage have I suggested that I dislike John Key’s life story. I’m just sick of hearing it.
Bully for you John, you lived a shitty life, now you don’t. This does not make you more or less equipped to run the country, it just makes you a poster child for Rod Deane and his cronies.
My point is that if Key is going to promulgate one area of his history then he has to reasonably expect that people are going to peer into others.
As it stands it shouldn’t count for shit whether or not he is Jewish, much like that damn awful “do you believe in God” interview he went through, that also is irrelevant.
The sad fact is some people out there will judge him for that.
I don’t believe Sonic was making that point, he/she was just saying that you seem somewhat inconsistent on your views and as for Tom S approving of the accuracy could he not be saying that National is really like a gang and that they say one thing and do another?
Your attempts at condensing are pithiness aren’t particularly funny and have fallen well short on accuracy.
February 5th, 2007 at 1:45 pm
condensing AND pithiness rather
February 5th, 2007 at 1:45 pm
Fair comment about the swastika – but as for the nose… well have you checked out how Murray Webb portrays Key…
http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/268384a17215.html
I think a basic rule of caricature is to exaggerate famous people’s prominent features… it would appear that cartoonists seem to agree that JK’s is his Manilow-esque schnozz.
February 5th, 2007 at 1:46 pm
I don’t think the big nose thing is a deliberate anti-semitic thing: it’s a standard device of cartoonists when someone has fairly nondescript features to lengthen the nose.
Ralph Steadman did it all the time, so did Ronald Scarfe (his most well-known cartoons are on the opening ‘Yes Minister’ sequence and are a good example of this).
the swastika though? It goes too far. Back when the Lange-Douglas team took over Labour from Rowling Tom Scott drew them as a street gang taking over from the civilised former leadership. Yep, he drew the German helmets – but instead of Nazi insignia he drew the old German Maltese Crosses. It’s quite clear he knew where to draw the line.
February 5th, 2007 at 1:57 pm
That’s rich coming from toms who on Jordan’s blog a while ago wanted legislation to control the media.
February 5th, 2007 at 2:05 pm
People should note I said I could reach no conclusion on the anti-semitic charge. I said myself cartoonists often do distort features.
However the glowing eyes are a bit harder to justify.
February 5th, 2007 at 2:12 pm
David, that is a bit of a cop-out. You are doing this a lot lately, dropping in a charge (ie anti-semitism) then saying you are not sure if it is true or not.
February 5th, 2007 at 2:19 pm
Sonic , I do miss your caustic wit, did Mr Cullen teach you ?
February 5th, 2007 at 2:35 pm
Lets see then, cartoon of islamic figure = quick lets control what people publish.
Clear nazi overtones and classic anti-Semitic features put on someone with a Jewish mother = nothing to see here.
Explain the need for pointed teeth and demonic eyes collected leftist stooges who were all swooning at some Danish cartoons not so long ago.
Funny how it was one of you lot who was calling the conservatives “anti-Semitic” in a little spittle splattered outburst recently.
Shame that DPF would probably be upset if I called you all full of shit.
February 5th, 2007 at 2:53 pm
What a good Jew you make David C. Obviously proud of your heritage. Reminds me of another Jew of a similar mind set to yours e.g. Karl Marx. Nice man he turned out to be.
My first reaction on seeing the cartoon was two fold. The cariature of John Key definetly resembled any of the cartoons you would see at a Holocaust Museum. Also the Nazi insignia is just another subtle dig from the left trying to suggest to the unthinking masses that Right Wing Pary = Far Right (Facist) Party. I doubt that the swastika was added for any other reason.
The cartoon would have been much more effective if it had just taken the piss.
February 5th, 2007 at 2:53 pm
Murray I don’t think this comes down to whether or not you’re left wing or right wing, I think this is just personal interpretation. I’m Jewish with leftist tendencies, where does that put me? Confused?
Stooge (n): flunky: a person of unquestioning obedience
I’m not sure if I’m unquestioning or that obedient to be honest.
Perhaps it is you who is the stooge as you are unable to see one iota of sense from anything left of Genghis Khan. This makes you the unquestioning obedient one I feel.
February 5th, 2007 at 2:54 pm
I sometimes wonder who Murray is arguing with, the imaginary leftist who lives in his head?
February 5th, 2007 at 3:05 pm
What I find most interesting is the little guy with the shotgun looks a lot like Phil Goff. What’s he doing on National’s side, or does Hodgson know something we don’t?
February 5th, 2007 at 3:11 pm
At a stretch I think it’s Nick Smith…
February 5th, 2007 at 4:07 pm
Thanks, Rob Hosking, for jolting my failing memory. I’d muddled two cartoon images in my mind and been looking for the wrong thing altogether.
I remembered Tom Scott’s cartoon (it’s in an anthology I have somewhere) but had a vague idea it was Jim McLay he’d portrayed as the bikie. But you’re right, it was Lange / Douglas. I still can’t find it, and maybe I’m imagining it too, but I seem to recall crazy eyes were a feature? I took it to imply, in an exaggerated way, “single minded insanity” not “deeply evil”.
McLay was always drawn as having a huge schnozz (which he pretty much does). I didn’t interpret that as in any way anti-Semitic, though I realise Key’s Jewish heritage makes that charge more plausible.
Tom is one of the gentler cartoonists in terms of physical exaggeration, though I was once portrayed as a looking like Dr Bunsen Honeydew but with hair and described as “doughy” in the accompanying story, which I steadfastly maintained to everyone was a typo for “doughty”.
You get into politics, something about you is going to be exaggerated by cartoonists. Live with it.
The swastika? I think southern raider has it spot on – a ham fisted and rather juvenile attempt to equate anything right of centre with Nazism.
Undertaking this post-modernist deconstruction all over the net simply gives the thing more credence than it deserves.
February 5th, 2007 at 4:27 pm
Sonic – go back to my original post where I said “At the end of the day I can’t conclude one way or another.”
That is not retreating from any position. That is saying one can make a fair argument either way, and wanting to know what others think.
February 5th, 2007 at 4:41 pm
Well to me it just shows how much John Key is getting up the noses of certain journalists and Labour Party syncophants and apologists.
For Sonic et al. Glad to see you have recovered from your intense blogging trying to skewer recent polls. Sorry you were found out but thems the breaks’
February 5th, 2007 at 4:46 pm
“”At the end of the day I can’t conclude one way or another.”
Which is what I said David, it is just a little bit of a cop out.
Personally, when I saw it on Sunday I thought it was a bit rubbish, but the idea of it being anti-semetic did not even occur to me.
I do find it surprising that many of those who screamed about “freedom of speech” during the Mohammed cartoons are now calling for a cartoonist to be sacked as they feel offended by his work. But that is, I suppose, par for the course.
February 5th, 2007 at 5:05 pm
I think some here are been a little bit too precious and thin-skinned. Its ONLY a cartoon for petes sake. If you’re going to be pedantic about a swastika, you could also argure that the portrayal of the clenched baseball bat, shotgun and knuckle dusters was also offensive. But I have better things to do.
February 5th, 2007 at 5:12 pm
Oh let it go we are getting as bad as the left. If National followers can not laugh at themselves then all is lost. Why work the party faithful into a fenzy, it just gives thoose on the left a stick to beat us.
February 5th, 2007 at 5:19 pm
I wonder, could you speculate that DPF has been our own little Fox-lite since he got his orders at the training session run by the Moslem murderers at the freedom ranch? I mean, using the “anti-semite” as a tool to squash debate is a very neo-con thing to do.
So is it just a coincidence? Just speculating you know, and I am not saying DPF consorts with people who murder Moslems.
Its amazing what you can get away with when you are just thinking out loud.
February 5th, 2007 at 5:21 pm
This liberal Jewbag is unruffled. I am quite familiar with the iconography of 30s German race-hate literature, and I don’t think this is that similar at all. (He should have a globular head, sloping forehead, thick lips, greasy slicked back hair, and stubble to be a proper Julius Streicher caricature).
On the other hand, the implication that the National leadership of the moment are intimidating shitkickers is bizzare.
February 5th, 2007 at 7:34 pm
John Key does not have a big nose.
How does Hodgson explain that?
February 5th, 2007 at 7:36 pm
Distortion of the nose my arse – the c**t that conceived this cartoon should be bloody ashamed of himself
February 5th, 2007 at 11:40 pm
“The swastika? I think southern raider has it spot on – a ham fisted and rather juvenile attempt to equate anything right of centre with Nazism.”
National would have quite happily invaded Iraq, committing NZ to one of the least justified and least successful wars ever.
No doubt they would have begun the installation of a Bush/Blair surveillance state too. Those societies are well down the slippery slope to fascism IMHO…
February 6th, 2007 at 11:02 am
David – while your posts are normally well rounded and well argued your credibility is taking a bit of a hit lately. This post takes the cake. As several have mentioned above the reason for the swastika is simply because gangs like to use it. Instead you go into some paranoid interpretation about it being all anti-semitic (albeit you state you cannot fully come to this conclusion). You have replied to several on this comments list but I notice you have avoided the most rational explanation given which is that swastiska is what gangs do.
Then recently you drew the conclusion that the Aussie BDO organisers were pandering to minorities, when in fact it was clear to all that they were trying to avoid trouble with the xenophobes. To your credit at least you quietly acknowledged that misinterpretation.
February 6th, 2007 at 11:08 am
David – while your posts are normally well rounded and well argued your credibility is taking a bit of a hit lately. This post takes the cake. As several have mentioned above the reason for the swastika is simply because gangs like to use it. Instead you go into some paranoid interpretation about it being all anti-semitic (albeit you state you cannot fully come to this conclusion). You have replied to several on this comments list but I notice you have avoided the most rational explanation given which is that swastiska is what gangs do.
Then recently you drew the conclusion that the Aussie BDO organisers were pandering to minorities, when in fact it was clear to all that they were trying to avoid trouble with the xenophobes. To your credit at least you quietly acknowledged that misinterpretation.
February 6th, 2007 at 11:15 am
I have to agree with Sonic here. If those Muhammad Cartoons were ok then it’s a bit hypocritical to be complaining about this. You really either get to condemn both, or neither, otherwise it comes across as only being accepting of offensive satirical imagery if it doesn’t offend your personal sensibilities.
Also another commenter mentioned the swastika in relation to the Mongrel Mob, which is quite accurate. I’m not sure if that’s exactly what the cartoonist was trying to portray, as opposed to the more common Nazi reference, but it’s to be considered. The swastika is a well known gang symbol in NZ.
February 7th, 2007 at 3:22 pm
Depicting a swastika is not anti-semitic. It doesn’t even really imply that those depicted with the swastika are anti-semitic. It’s a lame thing gangs do to make themselves seem tough.
The implication of the cartoon is obvious. National is a gang, and politics is gang warfare.
Which is a mildly amusing way of putting it. Certainly there are resemblances to gangs.
February 8th, 2007 at 8:12 pm
The implication of the cartoon is obvious. National is a gang, and politics is gang warfare.gangs.
Which is a mildly amusing way of putting it. Certainly there are resemblances to gangs.
*sigh* It’s pretty depressing to come back from two weeks in New South Wales – and the Aussies are showing all the class. And given the pretty high level of rat-bastardry that marks Australian politics, that’s not intended as a compliment.
With all due respect, Ben, I’ve done my time in the political trenches and seen the toxic waste of gang life in my own whanau. I think it’s utterly farcical to push the analogy too far.
May 13th, 2007 at 10:34 pm
Hot Blowjob!
blowjob movie
June 12th, 2007 at 8:33 am
mnsa kmpoc jqncmao gfisb tdnc oicuwms dwnblu
June 12th, 2007 at 8:34 am
mnsa kmpoc jqncmao gfisb tdnc oicuwms dwnblu
August 1st, 2010 at 6:23 pm
the swastika on the german helmet is a symbol of the mob. it has nothing to do with nazi’s or racism