Question

[chasovschik.livejournal.com]

Ladies and and Gentlemen,

I need some help. From discussions here I have got an impression that reference to a monkey is racistic. Various posters and signs featuring monkeys were more than once presented here in order to prove the racist nature of anti-Obama movement.

Being born far from here, I'm not sure I fully understand this cultural reference.

Here are two pictures:



First one is from Liberal Street Fighter, 2006, second one is from here, found via Google.

I will highly appreciate the comprehensive explanation: are both pictures racist? If only one, which one and why?


UPD: Thanks everybody, I got it. Could have guessed actually.

Comments

[johnny9fingers.livejournal.com]

Historical context.

[new-wave-witch.livejournal.com]

^exactly this

[chasovschik.livejournal.com]

Please elaborate.

[hikarugenji.livejournal.com]

Whites do not have a long tradition of being compared negatively to monkeys; blacks do. Therefore when Bush is drawn as a monkey the implication is simply that he's stupid, but there's nothing racist about it because there's no tradition of "white people = monkeys".

Racist portrayals and language are nothing but tradition and convention. There's no reason why certain words or images should be inherently racist; they become racist due to the tradition and history of use.

[soliloquy76.livejournal.com]

African Americans were widely caricatured as apes/monkeys in 19th and early 20th century America. It was always used in a racist context and is considered taboo today because of America's tumultuous history of racism.

[mylaptopisevil.livejournal.com]

now now now that caricature is still present in the 21st century.

[thebigbadbutch.livejournal.com]

What? Don't you know that as soon as someone says something mean about a white guy it completely erases all racism ever?

[wight1984.livejournal.com]

This.

[xforge.livejournal.com]

The one on the left is not racist because historically white men have not widely been referred to as "monkeys." Sorry if you don't see it, or if you don't like it (actually I really couldn't give a fuck) but that's just the fucking way it is.

[spamwarrior.livejournal.com]

Aggressive commenter so angry!

[xforge.livejournal.com]

Oh hell yeah (waves Irish hand over Irish head)

[yes-justice.livejournal.com]

Who were often negatively compared to blacks....

[wight1984.livejournal.com]

It's all about context.

Historically black people have been compared to monkeys. There are still racial slurs against black people that use that comparison. This is not the case for white people.

The former does not evoke any racial slur because there is none to be evoked.

The latter does evoke those racial slurs and does reinforce that negative image of black people.

[dwer.livejournal.com]

pretty much what everyone here has said. It's a fairly well known phenomenon, as well.

[xforge.livejournal.com]

phenomenon

doot dooooo, do do do

[blueduck37.livejournal.com]

If you wanna sit there and pretend that there is not a well-known, derogatory, racist historical context of black people being compared to and referred as "monkeys", then please be my guest.

I'll give you the benefit of the doubt since you were not born in America, but trust me when I tell you that in America there is a very serious, deep context of racism behind the monkey comparison for blacks.

[udoswald.livejournal.com]

The comparison exists outside America. The "macaca" slur that derailed that guy in Virginia (I can't for the life of me remember his name) was from the French.

[udoswald.livejournal.com]

As xforge said, Africans have historically been compared to monkeys (see: Macaca moment) as a way to suggest that they are racially inferior. Bush was compared to a monkey to suggest that he was dumb personally, Obama is compared to a monkey to suggest that his entire race is genetically inferior and unworthy of political power.

[mylaptopisevil.livejournal.com]

historical context, like everyone said.

[lafinjack.livejournal.com]

Just because.

[pragmatic-chimp.livejournal.com]

What everyone else said. I'd also like to point out - because I'm a petulant Anthropology major - that the animals pictured aren't monkeys - they're apes. The one the left is a bonobo, and the other is probably a baby chimp.

But the slur references apes as often as monkeys, so far as your question goes it's all one.

[chasovschik.livejournal.com]

Thanks for reminder. I know the difference, but can make a mistake easily because in Russian there is just one word for both monkeys and apes - обезьяны. In case of apes sometimes epithet "human-like" is added - человекообразные обезьяны.

[pragmatic-chimp.livejournal.com]

That seems to be true of a number of languages.

I spent about ten minutes in my Arabic class the other day trying to figure out what the word قرد meant. The video we watched in class claimed at one point that it meant "gorilla" but later it said "monkey." And my professor connected it a picture of a chimp on the flash cards he made us. Biology isn't his thing, so it was really hard to frame the question in a way that made sense to him.

Anyway, I was finally able to conclude that it means "monkey or ape" and not any specific species of primate.

[saint-monkey.livejournal.com]

not fond of looking primates in the mouth in these other cultures i guess. dentation is SO totally different.

[dearmisterecho.livejournal.com]

it is for this reason that I cringe an extra bit when people say "I DIDN'T EVOLVE FROM NO MONKEY!"


*faceplam*

I wanna go "no, you didn't...none of us did. We evolved from an ape ancestor, you twit."

[yes-justice.livejournal.com]

At some point we share a link with the monkey. I agree though, those people make it hard to believe they have evolved.

[dearmisterecho.livejournal.com]

You've got the picture it seems but, in the tradition of the community, here are some cartoons that shows the historical context.


19th century medical journal illustration trying to show through phrenology (study of the skull) that blacks were scientifically inferior to humans, more in common with apes.

And this is a clip from Spike Lee's "Bamboozled," it's a montage of stereotypical representations of blacks in film and cartoons. Especially pay attention to the cartoons: there was a preoccupation with representing blcaks as the "other", as African tribespeople who live the jungle and act, behave and live with...yes, the monkeys.


Hope this helps give clarification!

[dearmisterecho.livejournal.com]

forgot to note that the representations are from the late 19th century (onset of film - one of the earliest films made was "the watermelon eating contest, shown in the clip) up to around the 1940s.

[johnny9fingers.livejournal.com]

I'd forgotten how distressing some of those clips are, the extracts from D W Griffith's 'The Birth of a Nation' not least.

It does appear that some folk would prefer that we returned to those days. Oh well.

[dearmisterecho.livejournal.com]

Not oh well, more like oh jesus christ NO WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE GET OFF MY PLANET

[phillipalden.livejournal.com]

I'm not even touching this one, but note the icon.

[jamie-miller.livejournal.com]

http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/07/30/gates.police.apology/index.html

[beingjdc.livejournal.com]

I have to say, I did a double-take at this advertising campaign (scroll down)

http://www.4music.com/artist/tinchy-stryder/tinchy-stryder-profile.html

[kadaria.livejournal.com]

Just wanted to echo that yeah, it has to do with historical context.

[ladypolitik.livejournal.com]

A grandiose sense of self-importance will that that to a person.

[i.livejournal.com]

i wonder why lather2002 hasn't weighed in on this with some insightful, erudite comment.

[lather2002.livejournal.com]

(http://www.flickr.com/photos/48544571@N00/3917059125/)

[yes-justice.livejournal.com]

You try so hard!

[saint-monkey.livejournal.com]

As a monkey i am EXTREMELY offended. (Both pictures are of apes however, so not as offended as i COULD be.)

[saint-monkey.livejournal.com]

By the way... you should completely follow this up with a post asking why black kids can call each other ni**a in polite conversation without being racist, while white kids can not.

Yeah, that'd be AWESOME!

[saint-monkey.livejournal.com]

Yes and reclaiming the stereotype, etc etc. (I was bein sarcasic, and trying to draw attention to the absurdity of "see bush was a monkey too, therefore saying obama is a monkey != racism," but the internet, she robs me of subtlety.)

My favorite counter to this specific question is "and where exactly were you planning to use ni**er in polite conversation, mr. white man?"

[ladypolitik.livejournal.com]

1) Black people don't have a unified opinion on the subject of saying nigger in-group.

2) Context (!). A lot of white people use redneck or white trash in-group all the time and proudly so. If someone out-group used it in a derogatory manner they'd probably get pissed off, and rightfully so.


Bingo. I never understand, for the life of me, why people pretend to not be aware that the in-group vs. out-group factor cuts across every culture and runs generations.

[bord-du-rasoir.livejournal.com]

http://community.livejournal.com/politicsforum/2059783.html

[squidb0i.livejournal.com]

[lather2002.livejournal.com]

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/The-Left-overplays-the-race-card-for-Obama-8253120-59473377.html

[yes-justice.livejournal.com]

[yes-justice.livejournal.com]