Creative Education: Making the New Yorker Experience Work for Us

I have an idea for how the New Yorker can turn this situation around.

Judging from the interviews with the New Yorker editorial staff, it is clear that they did not expect this reaction.

That goes to show their own inability as white men to understand the depths of racism that still exists in this country, and also an inability to think about the consequences of running such a cartoon in this day and age.

On the merits, I also think that the cartoon was not satire because it fails to properly criticize/lampoon the perspective that it purports to be discrediting.  Rather, the images are just portrayed, without any internal critical referencing so necessary for successful satire.

I believe this lack of context and internal referencing is why so many, including me, were so offended.

Thus, I believe the opportunity to appropriately comment on the gross "Nixon-style" polarizing propaganda spewed by the likes of Faux News and others was lost.

But this need not be the final word on the matter.  Rather, I have an idea for the New Yorker on the flip that could bail it out of its predicament, and allow the nation to comment on Nixon-style politics, potentially banishing it forever (ha, ha) from the nation's discourse.

In essence, I think the cartoonist was lazy.  He properly identified many of the memes and signifiers that were being wildly thrown around by Faux News and others.

However, he then did not go far enough and continue to think about how to properly criticize them in the context of the cartoon.  This is absolutely necessary for satire, and if the cartoonist had done this, the cartoon could have taken its place among a great many fantastic New Yorker covers.

For instance, following would be my suggestion on how to improve this cartoon.  Draw a big mouth, say Bill O'Reilly's mouth with a conveyor belt-shaped tongue emanating from it and have these various memes rolling out as nice little products with all the other rightwing commentators "wrapping" them up for sale to the public.

As you may be able to appreciate, this would then place these memes in a context of rightwing, manufactured, conveyor-belt style propaganda, instead of presenting it as truth without any context whatsoever.

With this hastily-conceived improvement in mind, I propose the following solution:

A NEW YORKER TEACHING MOMENT FULFILLED

The New Yorker prides itself on its cartoons.  As a matter of fact, I know that every week the New Yorker has a cartoon contest, in which it invites its readers to submit punch lines for its cartoons.  (I know this because I'm a faithful reader of the New Yorker)

In the spirit of educating this country, and bailing the New Yorker out of this mess, I propose that the New Yorker create a new contest in which it holds an open call for the best cartoon to address the subject that the cartoonist sought to address in this particular cartoon.  This can include improvements to the cartoonist's attempt.  Then, the New Yorker should put all of the entries before the American people and have an online vote for the best cartoon.

In this way, the issue will receive continued attention, but it will be attention directed at the issue utilizing the creativity of Americans to address the issue in a better fashion.  And it will serve to amplify the problems with the current cartoon in a positive constructive manner.

Please contribute your thoughts, comments and further suggestions in the comments after taking the poll.

P.S.  If the New Yorker does NOT do this, then the Obama campaign might consider it as a fundraiser.