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July 16, 2008
I'm not offended
July 2008 Magazines, originally uploaded by KinoSport.
So there's this big stink about the New Yorker cover featuring the Obamas saluting each other with a "terrorist fist-jab" as an American flag burns in the fireplace. Predictably, lots of people are outraged. Obama, for his part, was a little more reasonable in his response:
"I know it was the New Yorker's attempt at satire. I don't think they were entirely successful with it. But you know what? It's a cartoon," Obama told CNN's Larry King, "and that's why we've got the First Amendment."
The Illinois Senator said that the depiction did not personally offend him, and that he’s seen worse in his run for president which has made him get "a pretty thick skin."
This is a great response. I don't want to say the people who are outraged or offended are wrong, but I think it's misguided. It is clearly a satirical cover; it's not meant to perpetuate Obama stereotypes. Instead, it exaggerates and ridicules them.
One of the things I dislike about being somewhat liberal is this sense that everything has to outrage me. Maybe I'm a bad liberal, but lots of things don't offend me. A lot of times, to make a cogent point, somebody has to be offended. There's only so much insight that can be gained by being bland.
What's more, it seems against the liberal ethos to demand apologies, censor publications, and make loud protests when somebody posts insensitive imagery. To me, heavyhanded meddling is the kind of stuff for which we should criticize the Bush Administration.
Obama's campaign shouldn't embrace the New Yorker cover, but it should respect it and move on. It's part of living in a democracy, with a First Amendment that protects a healthy discourse. Obama correctly points this out, and continual complaining is not going to help his campaign.
I see the need for Obama's campaign to be on attack mode, in order to carefully manage his image. But it needs to recognize what is and what is not worthy of a response. Unsubstantiated rumors that Obama went to a radical Muslim terrorist school? Have at it. Satirical magazine covers? As Paul McCartney might say, let it be.
entry no. 1186
Posted at July 16, 2008 09:39 AM