New York Post Protest
NEW YORK — About 200 people, outraged over a New York Post cartoon, have been protesting in front of the newspaper’s Manhattan offices.
The cartoon in Wednesday’s Post by Sean Delonas shows two police officers, one with a smoking gun, standing over the body of a bullet-riddled chimp. The caption reads: “They’ll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill.”
Activist minister Al Sharpton says they’ll be back again Friday.
The newspaper has stood by the work, which its editor called “a clear parody” about the police killing of a chimpanzee in Connecticut. The Post said it had no further comment on Thursday.
The cartoon refers to a chimpanzee named Travis who was killed Monday by police in Stamford, Conn., after it mauled a friend of its owner.
Some critics called the cartoon racist and said it trivialized a tragedy in which a woman was disfigured and a chimpanzee killed.
Others said the cartoon suggests that Obama should be assassinated.
Many urged a boycott of the Post and the companies that advertise in it.
“How could the Post let this cartoon pass as satire?” said Barbara Ciara, president of the National Association of Black Journalists. “To compare the nation’s first African-American commander in chief to a dead chimpanzee is nothing short of racist drivel.”
State Sen. Eric Adams called it a “throwback to the days” when black men were lynched.
The Rev. Al Sharpton called the cartoon “troubling at best given the historic racist attacks of African-Americans as being synonymous with monkeys.”
The cartoon set off a furious response against the Post. Its phones rang all day with angry callers. Protesters picketed the tabloid’s Manhattan offices, demanding an apology and a boycott and chanting “shut the Post down.”
Col Allan, editor-in-chief of the Post, defended the work.
“The cartoon is a clear parody of a current news event, to wit the shooting of a violent chimpanzee in Connecticut,” Allan said in a statement. “It broadly mocks Washington’s efforts to revive the economy. Again, Al Sharpton reveals himself as nothing more than a publicity opportunist.”
The cartoon drew hundreds of comments on the Internet including at the liberal Huffington Post, where columnist Sam Stein wrote: “At its most benign, the cartoon suggests that the stimulus bill was so bad, monkeys may as well have written it. Most provocatively, it compares the president to a rabid chimp.”
White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs declined comment.
“I have not seen the cartoon,” he told reporters aboard Air Force One as Obama returned to Washington from Arizona, where he announced his plan to deal with the foreclosure crisis. “But I don’t think it’s altogether newsworthy reading the New York Post.”
It is not the first time that Delonas, the longtime cartoonist for the Post’s Page Six, has raised eyebrows with a heavy-handed caricature.
An earlier Delonas cartoon made fun of Paul McCartney’s ex-wife Heather Mills for having only one leg, and another compared gay people seeking marriage licenses to sheep lovers. In a cartoon last month, an enormous Jessica Simpson dumps boyfriend Tony Romo for Ronald McDonald.
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It’s sorta funny the way it works isn;t it. For years I saw cartoons of Geaorge W looking like a monkey, but no outrage about that. But this cartoon draws rage from the African Amercain population!? Why is it that African Americans are so eager to come forward about race, when they themselves are the biggest racists around? They don’t want to be called the n* word (for good reason I don’t blame em) but they have no problems using it freely amongst themselves. I can tell you that if I didn’t want to be called something I wouldn’t use it, I would let it die out. African Americans want to be equal, and I am all for it, but they also want benifits from being a minority. African Americans have no problems being racist towards any other race, watch comedy channels, but they don’t like it when other races point fun at them. African Americans are the biggest hypocrits around. Treat others how you would like to be treated is my rule of thumb. Don’t sweat the small stuff. It’s a whole new world out there. The President is an African American, what else do you need to tell you how much peoples views of others has changed? Should I boycott Comedy Central because the majority of African American comedians on the channel are racist against white people? Maybe I’ll sue them instead.
ai3di - February 20, 2009 at 12:27 am
Really, this is ridiculous. Phrases like “monkey business,” “barrel of monkeys,” and even analogies to monkeys in general have long been used in political satire to describe inept politicians, and with no racial overtones for the most part. The vast majority of the time, they describe white politicians. There are tons of cartoons comparing George W Bush’s intelligence to that of a monkey. Is that also racist? When it comes to race relations, the problem is not this cartoon, it’s our society’s hypersensitivity and political opportunism. Just because the Al Sharpton’s of the world can manipulate feelings to create racial tensions, doesn’t mean that was the intent of the cartoon. I mean come on, this how Sharpton makes a living – he forces the issue, turns it into something it’s not, and proclaims himself as the leader of the fight against some vague injustice. Why weren’t we demanding he apologize to those falsely accused and mistreated Duke lacross players?
What’s far more disturbing about the cartoon than some contrived racial overtone is its reference to this poor women who happens to be still fighting for her life. The cartoon is extremely ill-timed in that respect, by making essentially a joke out of her whole situation. Where’s the media lambasting the cartoon for that? Where’s Keith Olberman on his moral pedestal ranting about the real problems? No, no, you get much more attention if you start waiving around the race card. In this way, the cartoon is disrespectful and so is the media for its dismissiveness and lack of judgment.
Joe - February 20, 2009 at 2:58 pm
What is wrong with everybody? What about all the cartoons of Bush? So they were ok? Everyone is up in arms about this cartoon because they feel it is racist!! I am so sick of this!! Get over yourselves! The stimulus bill is so bad it may have been wriitten better by a chimpanzee! Does anyone care how bad this bill is or are you glad you got a black president that you don’t care what he does!!! What’s worse, the really offensive thing about this cartoon is that a poor victim of this poor animal is in the hospital fighting for her life! Doesn’t anyone, including the New York Times, care about this? Yes, I’m offended by the cartoon, but only for the woman in the hospital. Totally disrespectful to her and the owner of this animal. Racist, no way.
Robyn - February 20, 2009 at 3:16 pm
ai3di Says:
1. Monkeys have never been understood to apply to white people in a negative way as blacks–by ignorant white people.
2. True, the “N” world is ugly no matter who uses. Too bad black people are so negatively influenced by white people relative to its use.
3. If blacks were treated equal in the first place, they would not have to take advantage of minority opportunities.
4. Blacks are negatively influenced by whites who enslaved them who were and still are racist, like yourself.
5. So there is a black president, he is a man with red blood like white presidents. His being president is not owing to the mentality of ignrant white people or other racist people of other races, who did not vote for him or who did but not for the right reason (some ignorant white people are like that…).
6. White people put on the black face for years in comedy.
7. Go pray for your sins and hatred of people of color any color.
8. Sorry, I sound like a racist against white people I am working on not be a racist against any race–since all humans have “red blood” and are of a higher intellect than animals.
Antonia - February 20, 2009 at 4:31 pm
Joe and Robyn:
See response to ai3di…. You people have a real problem, stop making excuses. It was an ugly insensitive, ambiguous cartoon and the author of it knew it or should have know such…unless he is truely ignorant!
Antonia - February 20, 2009 at 4:38 pm
Antonia, you are the ignorant one.
Its a cartoon.
People need to get over theselves.
shags - February 20, 2009 at 4:45 pm
Antonia:
1. Monkeys have been used in derogatory references to black people, Jews, President Bush, anyone considered incompetent or irresponsible, etc. That doesn’t mean we have to be so oversensitive that we banish all monkeys from cartoons. Find me any image that hasn’t been used somewhere, somehow with a negative connotation.
2. I’m not sure what you’re trying to say with #2. Are you blaming the prevalence of that term among black people on the actions of white people? Also, did you know that historically the term has also been used for Irish, Arabs, and Native Americans?
3. No one is treated as an equal in the first place. Research the history of the Irish people in America and elsewhere. Did you know the system of slavery used by Americans for African slaves was based on the system used by the English for Irish slaves? Are you familiar with the 19th c. job discrimination against the Irish? But they rose above it. They overcame, and got over it, and stopped playing the race card.
4. Most white people aren’t nearly as racist as Jeremiah Wright and Al Sharpton. It’s much more PC for a black person to be a racist than a white one. So how are white people negatively influencing you more than Al Sharpton is negatively influencing them? Maybe he’s the one perpetuating this. Maybe if you stopped playing the victim and took charge of your life, you would finally overcome.
5. Obama’s election is the combined result of the decisions of white people, “ignrant” or otherwise, black people, and people of all races. Many intelligent and reasonable people voted for him, and many voted for McCain. There’s much less evidence that racism influenced the “white vote” than certain other demographics… But what does this have to do with the cartoon?
6. Yes, a long time ago racist “black face” humour was mainstream for white people. Are you saying this justifies the continuation of racist humour? Are you saying it’s ok to be racist if someone was racist to you first? If so, all white people now have a reason to be racist (due to the aforementioned anti-white racism). Your eye-for-eye mentality is disheartening.
7. None of the comments preceding yours expressed hatred.
8. Actually, many animals have red blood too (when it’s oxidized). I disagree with intellect as the measure of one’s humanity. Marilyn vos Savant is no more or less human than you or I. The intelligence argument is especially dangerous since it has been used to justify racism. (Underprivileged minorities tend to test worse, on average, in any culture.)
vvl - February 20, 2009 at 9:20 pm