Watching this video clip, I am once again struck by the horror that is out there. The "witch doctor" poster is particularly disturbing. I find it more and more difficult to place items like this in proper perspective and end up very frightened by them.
Do you recall the "Summer of the Shark?" There appeared to be a cluster of shark attacks/deaths and we (us and the media) turned that into a major phenomena. However, the actual numbers that summer were below the average for the season. Prominence in the media bred a false sense of importance - sheesh, when's the last time THAT happened, eh?
Many many of us now get our information via diffuse internet channels - this has had benefits, but also significant drawbacks. The speed with which Twitter can pass along a story is countered by the spreading of false or incorrect information. However, one only needs to look to the reporting of shots fired on the Potomac River near the Pentagon on 9/11/09 to see that even more conventional news sources make the same errors these days.
This same internet driven method of following current events allows for the easy dissemination of video like the one above. I too have now passed it along on Facebook and here. What does this man and his frightened/frightening world view indicate? This is where I begin to lose any sense of perspective which in turn feeds my fear.
I'd like to get back to the choice of images used. This poster caused me to gasp. I posted earlier about recognizing that the hatred out there for President Obama appears to be as intense as my hatred of President Bush before him.
I took a moment to think about images of Bush in political cartoons and what direction the caricatures took. My best recollections were that George Bush more often then not was portrayed as a small child (with large ears) being directed by "Uncle Dick."
I went upstairs and pulled down two dusty volumes that I read many, many years ago, Faces of the Enemy: Reflections of the Hostile Imagination by Sam Keen and War Without Mercy: Race & Power in the Pacific War by John Dower. Both deal with images of propaganda in war time.
In particular they make a comparison between anti-Nazi propaganda and anti-Japanese propaganda. The difference was striking and revealed a deep seated racism in our culture.
Images of the Nazis often over emphasized the uniform and had them wearing reflector sunglasses. The humanity of the individual was minimized. The emphasis was always on the political though, not the "German." Anti-Japanese propaganda, however, often depicted the Japanese soldiers as apes or vermin. The emphasis was clearly a racial one with the Japanese being portrayed as less than.
What then to make of the increasingly ugly images and rhetoric used against President Obama? I am at a loss as to how we proceed in a fashion that doesn't simply strengthen the chasm growing between us.
Professor Burgos, my friend from high school, posted the YouTube clip at his blog Splunge! and suggests that this is further indication of the demise of the Republican Party. I hope he's right and this is all an exaggeration of an increasingly diminished yet vocal minority.
Peace.
Do you recall the "Summer of the Shark?" There appeared to be a cluster of shark attacks/deaths and we (us and the media) turned that into a major phenomena. However, the actual numbers that summer were below the average for the season. Prominence in the media bred a false sense of importance - sheesh, when's the last time THAT happened, eh?
Many many of us now get our information via diffuse internet channels - this has had benefits, but also significant drawbacks. The speed with which Twitter can pass along a story is countered by the spreading of false or incorrect information. However, one only needs to look to the reporting of shots fired on the Potomac River near the Pentagon on 9/11/09 to see that even more conventional news sources make the same errors these days.
This same internet driven method of following current events allows for the easy dissemination of video like the one above. I too have now passed it along on Facebook and here. What does this man and his frightened/frightening world view indicate? This is where I begin to lose any sense of perspective which in turn feeds my fear.
I'd like to get back to the choice of images used. This poster caused me to gasp. I posted earlier about recognizing that the hatred out there for President Obama appears to be as intense as my hatred of President Bush before him.
I took a moment to think about images of Bush in political cartoons and what direction the caricatures took. My best recollections were that George Bush more often then not was portrayed as a small child (with large ears) being directed by "Uncle Dick."
I went upstairs and pulled down two dusty volumes that I read many, many years ago, Faces of the Enemy: Reflections of the Hostile Imagination by Sam Keen and War Without Mercy: Race & Power in the Pacific War by John Dower. Both deal with images of propaganda in war time.
In particular they make a comparison between anti-Nazi propaganda and anti-Japanese propaganda. The difference was striking and revealed a deep seated racism in our culture.
Images of the Nazis often over emphasized the uniform and had them wearing reflector sunglasses. The humanity of the individual was minimized. The emphasis was always on the political though, not the "German." Anti-Japanese propaganda, however, often depicted the Japanese soldiers as apes or vermin. The emphasis was clearly a racial one with the Japanese being portrayed as less than.
What then to make of the increasingly ugly images and rhetoric used against President Obama? I am at a loss as to how we proceed in a fashion that doesn't simply strengthen the chasm growing between us.Professor Burgos, my friend from high school, posted the YouTube clip at his blog Splunge! and suggests that this is further indication of the demise of the Republican Party. I hope he's right and this is all an exaggeration of an increasingly diminished yet vocal minority.
Peace.
2 comments:
How is that poster legal? I don't think it would be here.
We have this freedom of speech thing here that can really test us some times.
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