Kesher Talk points out that Deborah Lipstadt has withdrawn as a judge from the Israeli Anti-Semitic Cartoon Contest. I'll admit that when I first heard about the contest, I thought it was great, and when I heard Lipstadt was going to judge, I thought it was brilliant, but after seeing some of the entries so far, I'm not so sure anymore. Maybe I'm just having an indecisive day, but it would have been better had the cartoons stuck to classic themes and avoided current events -- like this and this.
Like you, I am having second thoughts about the cartoon contest. Too easy for it to become cruel and demeaning. For some, it is a short trip from satire to bigotry.
The problem with the first example is that it isn't funny in any way, it's a literal exercise in getting down in the mud with the pigs, and, indeed exactly what you would see in the anti-semitic media. Maybe I'm giving Demona Comix too much credit, I think the contest sponsor's unstated purpose was to make fun of the anti-semites and holocaust deniers, not to provide them with material that plays to their beliefs. (I'm old enough to remember feminist Germane Greer posing in the buff in such a manner that the picture would never make Playboy because a certain oriface was visible.) The second example -- it's borderline. The point was to show an absurdity -- that there would be any likelihood of Ghandi and MLK (the latter in particular) endorsing Hitler on earth or in heaven, or even of Hitler making it to heaven. The best submission I've seen so far, in terms of the right spirit, was the one of Moses's "secret 11th commandment to control the media". What most of the contributions so far lack is subtlety and wit, qualities completely unknown to bigots.
[an error occurred while processing this directive]
[an error occurred while processing this directive]
Like you, I am having second thoughts about the cartoon contest. Too easy for it to become cruel and demeaning. For some, it is a short trip from satire to bigotry.
The problem with the first example is that it isn't funny in any way, it's a literal exercise in getting down in the mud with the pigs, and, indeed exactly what you would see in the anti-semitic media. Maybe I'm giving Demona Comix too much credit, I think the contest sponsor's unstated purpose was to make fun of the anti-semites and holocaust deniers, not to provide them with material that plays to their beliefs. (I'm old enough to remember feminist Germane Greer posing in the buff in such a manner that the picture would never make Playboy because a certain oriface was visible.) The second example -- it's borderline. The point was to show an absurdity -- that there would be any likelihood of Ghandi and MLK (the latter in particular) endorsing Hitler on earth or in heaven, or even of Hitler making it to heaven. The best submission I've seen so far, in terms of the right spirit, was the one of Moses's "secret 11th commandment to control the media". What most of the contributions so far lack is subtlety and wit, qualities completely unknown to bigots.