Saturday, December 11, 2004
BELL SO OTT, HE’S HIS OWN SATIRE
I couple of days ago I bought myself the print edition of the Guardian. I’m not entirely sure why, perhaps I wanted to remind myself of the days when I was a daily reader (I stopped reading due to that fact that I’d have to pay for the paper myself now). Anyway, I was interrupted for several days in the middle of reading so I only got to the editorial page today. Leaving aside some of the disagreeable commentary found there, Steven Bell’s cartoon is an absolute cracker. Is this stretching it just that bit too far? I mean, honestly, are there people who can take anything about that serious? And yes, I know cartoons are not supposed to be all serious, but they are supposed to give pause for thought about something serious. But this time Bell has really overdone it and clouded any sense there could have been out into it. I mean, come on, Why doesn’t Bush have horns? Perhaps Condi should have forked tongue protruding from her mouth? And why the crosses? If he wants to go in for some Hitler-relativisation why didn’t he just use swastikas? If you asked me to make an over-the-top cartoon to parody the anti-Bush left, I’m not sure I could possibly have topped this. The only pause for thought it gives you is about the curious mentality of the kind of people who draw this and think it belongs on the editorial page of a major newspaper.
I couple of days ago I bought myself the print edition of the Guardian. I’m not entirely sure why, perhaps I wanted to remind myself of the days when I was a daily reader (I stopped reading due to that fact that I’d have to pay for the paper myself now). Anyway, I was interrupted for several days in the middle of reading so I only got to the editorial page today. Leaving aside some of the disagreeable commentary found there, Steven Bell’s cartoon is an absolute cracker. Is this stretching it just that bit too far? I mean, honestly, are there people who can take anything about that serious? And yes, I know cartoons are not supposed to be all serious, but they are supposed to give pause for thought about something serious. But this time Bell has really overdone it and clouded any sense there could have been out into it. I mean, come on, Why doesn’t Bush have horns? Perhaps Condi should have forked tongue protruding from her mouth? And why the crosses? If he wants to go in for some Hitler-relativisation why didn’t he just use swastikas? If you asked me to make an over-the-top cartoon to parody the anti-Bush left, I’m not sure I could possibly have topped this. The only pause for thought it gives you is about the curious mentality of the kind of people who draw this and think it belongs on the editorial page of a major newspaper.
Labels: USA
