Caricatures Ireland

I’m agog at Martyn Turner’s Irish Times cartoon today on Bertie Ahern’s trips to Nigeria. Bertie’s in a pot, being cooked alive, in the imagination of the paper reader. Well, I’m afraid framing the imagery like this does not absolve the cartoonist, who makes the final decision on the imagery in a gag. If Turner’s implying the Irish are racist, he should be more explicit about it. As it stands, Turner’s reached for the most negative stereotype to associate with Nigeria, stopping short of “natives” with bones through their noses. However, these natives have a semantic association and appear in the mind’s eye of the reader: the savage maneater cooking the white explorer is a well-established trope.

I’m not calling Turner a racist. Turner’s donated his work to development education material for years so I can’t imagine he’s setting out to offend, and it does have a sympathetic punchline. However this cartoon reproduces, and therefore helps perpetuate, negative stereotypes about Nigerians specifically and Africans generally.

I wonder how Nigerian Irish Times readers will take to it.

Tags: Cartoons, africa, cartoonists by Allan
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UPDATE:

• Thomson Safari’s Rick and Judi try to intimidate Brian MacCormaic
• Trent’s notes on what was happening to the Maasai
• Thomson’s shady relationship with the Tanzanian government
• The Observer on Thomson Safaris and Masai treatment

Thomson Safaris is an American-based company that’s been linked to a story that Trent Keegan was investigating before he was murdered, on the forced eviction of Maasai in Tanzania.

Karen Schwartzman, a spokeswoman for the company, had this to say in response to their name being associated with the murder:
“Obviously it’s a tragedy. But the fact this company has had its name associated with this nightmare is another tragedy.”

So according to Thomson Safaris the fact that their name has got muddied is as tragic as the brutal theft of Trent Keegan’s life, the permanent denial his family now endure of their son and brother, and the numbing grief felt around the world by the hundreds of people Trent befriended.

That attitude alone is enough for me to ask, if you’re going on safari, don’t go Thomson Safari.

UPDATE: Karen’s rhetorical flourishes continue: ‘”We have nothing to do with this,” says Karen Schwartzman, a spokesperson for Massachusetts-based Thompson Safaris. “This company continues to be victimized by a number of rumors and innuendo.”‘
Victimised. Rumours. Innuendo. Protest. Too. Much.

Tags: Trent Keegan, africa, news, stupidity, tanzania, thomson safaris by Allan
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