A weblog by Jonathan Ali
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| Notes from a small island A weblog by Jonathan Ali |
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Tuesday, August 05, 2003 The editorial cartoon in Monday's Guardian really has me baffled. Meant as a comment on the closure of one of the country's sugar refineries and the laying off of its thousands of workers, the cartoon shows a gentleman of Indian descent, holding the money from the separation package in his hand, with two contending thoughts on his mind: one, to deposit the money in the bank; the other, to go spend the money on rum. Now, there's no question that the majority of workers in the sugar industry are of Indian descent; no problem there. But the message the cartoon sends is, simply, racist, based on the stereotype of Indo-Trinidadian men - and rural Indo-Trinidadian men in particular - as alcoholics. (No doubt the recent popularity of the song "Rum Till I Die" informed the cartoon as well.) As I say, I'm more baffled than offended, though the cartoon is distasteful in the extreme. I just cannot understand how the Guardian cartoonist could have found such a thing even remotely funny, and more puzzlingly, how the editor could have agreed with him. I haven't seen or heard any reaction on this so far, but I hope I do, and not just from the usual ethnocentric quarters. posted by Jonathan | 9:51 PM 0 comments 0 Comments: |
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