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Is "Racist" the Correct Term for the GOP ?

by: elwood

Thu Mar 04, 2010 at 19:23:44 PM EST
The RNC has been raising money with a pitch that includes a PowerPoint depiction of the President in whiteface as the Joker from the recent Batman movie. Republico has the slide deck.

If you attended the Blue Hampshire Bash in Concord last year you may remember the "Obama as Joker" sign. It has been a staple of hard-right activists, maybe since the movie came out. It's adoption by the Republican National Party is new, though.

I heard about the RNC campaign in an interview on NPR, in which the Politico reporter absolved the RNC from charges of racism.

Too quickly, IMO.

Let's examine the graphic a little more closely. You need to know a bit about comic book lore here.
elwood :: Is "Racist" the Correct Term for the GOP ?
First, it isn't really "the Joker." There is no campy Cesar Romero from the Adam West series here. It is far more specific: this is the Heath Ledger Joker. Like all depictions of the character in DC Comics since at least the 1980s, he is not at all funny: he is an insane serial killer, incapable of rehabilitation.

(The re-imagining of Batman began in the 1980s with Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns in which Batman finally and reluctantly kills the Joker. That was set in the future, so he still populates today's DC Universe.)

So, the RNC has adopted the rightwing activist - it may be unfair to pin this on the Tea Party movement - equation of President Obama to an insane, murderous, irredeemable villain who is regularly used to pose the question: "Shouldn't they just execute him?"

But wait - there's more.

This is very specifically the Heath Ledger Batman. The image, with the blood dripping from the corners of the mouth, comes from that movie and nowhere else.

Heath Ledger died unexpectedly, before the activists started promoting this graphical equation.

===
So, is it racism?

I think so. The portrayal of Obama as a Very Scary Threat unseen before in American politics makes no sense, in terms of his style or his policies. But it does make sense if you think that it's easy to scare Americans about Black People.

Reasonable people can perhaps disagree on that.

It's harder to dismiss the dog-whistle message in the comparison: "Obama = Joker. He should be killed, and we are using a dead man's image to show that even the Joker can die."

Oh, but it's all in fun! Where's your sense of humor?

That's just what the Joker says, after each round of killings.
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Is "Racist" the Correct Term for the GOP ? | 30 comments
I think so too. (4.00 / 2)
Thank you Elwood.

'Aints no more
There's no question Obama's race plays a role (4.00 / 2)
in some of the extremism on the other side.

And then there are those who willfully fan the flames of racism and racial resentment and day after day, our popular culture lets him get away with it:

Limbaugh has spent plenty of time talking about President Obama and "reparations," and has also had plenty to say about health care reform, but as far as I can tell, yesterday was one of those rare instances in which the host combined the two.

I'm going to go on a limb here and describe this as about the most racist thing a major American media personality has said in quite a while. This is about Limbaugh trying - with no subtlety at all - to stir up racial fears and anxiety in the hopes of blocking improvements to a dysfunctional health care system, which has repeatedly screwed over a fair amount of Limbaugh's audience.

The racism isn't even restrained. Limbaugh has trashed progressive efforts to improve America's health care system for years, but notice he didn't start talking about "reparations" and comparing reform to a "civil rights bill" until the President of the United States was African American. The nauseating message is about as subtle as a sledgehammer.


Question? (4.00 / 1)
I'm usually the first to chastise the Left for not responding to mud flung from the Right but I have mixed feelings here.

It seems like Limbaugh and company want to take all discussion of Obama as far away from the issues as possible and have the ensuing discussion be as divisive as possible.

Are we playing into their hands by focusing on incidents like this? If the Repub's goal was to frame a variety of issues as a matter of a race is there a possibility that we are actually helping them accomplish that by calling them racists?  

Bresler for Emperor

[ Parent ]
Probably - (0.00 / 0)
Elsewhere in the thread I said, I would never make this a campaign issue - it's got not legs.

Just so we know what we're up against.

[ Parent ]
definitely better to be informed (0.00 / 0)
I didn't mean to imply that this diary shouldn't exist or that we shouldn't be having this discussion. I apologize if it reads that way.

What I meant to refer to was the fact that we are far from the only ones talking about the leaked memo.

Bresler for Emperor

[ Parent ]
Call me crazy. (0.00 / 0)
I call defaming an American President in these terms akin to treason.


http://www.nytimes.com/aponlin...
The presentation encourages fundraisers to use a direct marketing pitch that exploits ''extreme negative feelings toward existing Administration.'' It also describes ways to appeal to major donors, including ''peer to peer pressure,'' ''access'' and ''ego driven.''

The document does illustrate an essential fact about fundraising, however. ''If you can't scare the hell out of donors, you're not going to get any money,'' Republican strategist John Feehery said

''This is inartfully done,'' Feehery said. ''But the fact of the matter is Democrats were trying to scare the hell out of their donors about George Bush's 'fascism,' they were trying to scare the hell (out of donors) about Sarah Palin and her stupidity and her religious zealotry.

''The ugly truth of fundraising is you try to caricature the opposition -- you don't get any money if you call your opponent a good guy,'' Feehery said.


I think Bush & Co., especially Cheney and the Unitary Executive, was a pure power grab, a fascist putsch if you will. Obama is no joker. He is an earnest mensch. the comparison is false.

'Aints no more
Racism (0.00 / 0)
has been the GOP's ace in the hole since Nixon.  There are lots of code words for it, states rights, welfare, law and order, etc.  I must admit, though, that the underlying current here in NH has surprised me.  The men are more blatant, but too many women remark on their "discomfort" with Obama.  He's not like us, not what we are used to.  If his skin was white, he would be exactly what they are used to, a well-educated, intelligent, successful man.  

We believe in prosperity & opportunity, strong communities, healthy families, great schools, investing in our future and leading the world by example. We are Democrats; we are the change you're looking for.
the latest code word (4.00 / 2)
is socialist.  
[ Parent ]
"The health care bill is reparations." (4.00 / 6)
Beck:  "The health care bill is reparations.  It's the beginning of reparations."

When they say Socialism, they mean redistribution of wealth from whites to blacks. Or as Beck says, reparations.

www.KusterforCongress.com - www.paulhodesforsenate.com
www.nikitsongas.com - www.devalpatrick.com

This is starkly rascist-- without even the pretense of cover. (4.00 / 6)

It is exactly what Lee Atwater belatedly begged for forgiveness on his deathbed. Limbaugh started it, Beck has doubled down. I do not think that most of the Tea Party  people are racist-- the ones I know are not--but there is certainly a sizable group within it that use the misdirected anger of the Teas to validate their own pathological rascism. Despicable people like Beck and Limbaugh are the Father Coughlins of our day.

"But, in the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false about hope." Si se puede. Yes we can.  
[ Parent ]
Well said, Paul n/t (0.00 / 0)

[ Parent ]
Groupists. (0.00 / 0)
Most people who self-identify as Republicans now are groupists.  Perhaps because they can't recognize people as individuals, they see everyone as part of a group that has common characteristics which are largely superficial--i.e. easy to identify.  It's sort of like how we identify bluebirds and blackbirds, etc.  The categories have no relationship to behavior because behavior isn't recognized either.
I'd compare it to the same mentality which designed and sold cars in the fifties and sixties on the basis of fins, tail lights, grills and hood ornaments.  PR has moved from selling cars to selling politicians and fear.  Hollywood has moved to Wallywood on the Potomac.  There's an audience that likes to be scared.  
One characteristic of groupists is their tendency to morph into groupies or fans.  So, what has GOP leaders really quaking in their loafers is the possibility of Obama becoming an action hero.  Preempting that by presenting him as the Joker is playing with fire.  Or, perhaps it's akin to fighting fire with fire.

One of the things to keep in mind about people who can't see others as individuals is that their assessment of any situation is more often wrong than right, probably because it's informed by their own fears.  Consequently, their responses are not only wrong, but self-defeating.  If you spurn a hot dog because it looks like a turd, you're going to end up hungry for no good reason.

No. and Yes. And a caveat. (0.00 / 0)
elwood, I honestly dont believe there is a connection between the Joker image and racism.  Yes, it is clearly the Heath Ledger Joker, because that is the contemporary culture's image of the Joker.  (Few under 45 have even ever heard of Cesar Romero, my friend...)  Yes, it's political, it's derogatory....but it's not racist.  It's simply applying the character traits of the Leadger-Joker to the President.  

Having said that, I would bet that there are few white folk who as sensitive as I am to racism - including racism that is unintended and based in cluelessness.  I have six adopted children, all racial minorities, and I have my share of tales to tell that elucidate ignorance and racism, believe me.  

Is the GOP racist?  Well, the GOP only exists as a collection of millions of individuals, and to claim 'they are all racists' is to be guilty of the steroetyping and prejudice you yourself abhor.  However, if you want to raise the issue as to whether or not the GOP, as a party, has used racism and racial divides to generate votes...the answer is an unalterable, incontrovertible YES, just as they have used xenophobia and homophobia.  Many suburbs around the country were hotbeds of GOP votes during the decades of the 60s-80s because the GOP would fear-monger and run ads that told suburbanites to preserve their quality of life (read: keep out those low-class, crime-ridden, immigrant, spanish-speaking and dark-skinned types from the City from taking over the 'burbs.")

So yeah, there's a huge dose of racism in Nixon's "Southern Stratagy" and many campaigns that followed (although many Democrats share in that slimy strategy - one only need to look to South Boston for evidence).  But to be honest, regardless of how much you may not like the Jokeresque Obama, and regardless of how much racism may fuel opposition to his Presidency, I really dont see racism inherent in the Joker poster.

NOT our "better" angels (0.00 / 0)
... if you want to raise the issue as to whether or not the GOP, as a party, has used racism and racial divides to generate votes...the answer is an unalterable, incontrovertible YES, just as they have used xenophobia and homophobia.

The racial aspect of "the joker.":


www.KusterforCongress.com - www.paulhodesforsenate.com
www.nikitsongas.com - www.devalpatrick.com

[ Parent ]
sorry, I dont see it. (0.00 / 0)
I think there is enough uncontrovertible evidence of racism in politics that this stretch is unproductive ... even counter-productive.  It's a picture of Obama as the Joker...period.

NOW..if you're telling me that these two pictures are appearing TOGETHER, that is an entirely different story.  But the Joker picture by itself, though it may be many things, is not inherently racist. I think real issues of racism lose credibility when we strecth so.

[ Parent ]
The diary title isn't a simple question - (4.00 / 2)
I agree with you that No, individual Republicans are not inherently racist, and most do not choose that Party because of racial concerns.

When I spoke of the GOP I meant the Party organization itself. As you noted, the Southern Strategy and other campaign and policy choices - I would include Reagan kicking off his Presidential campaign in the Mississippi town where the church bombing killed four children - are clearer evidence of a Party choosing to exploit racism.

But I really cannot see any explanation for using the Obama Joker image except the promotion of "Scary Black Man". That would be racist.

If the caricature bore some relationship to the candidate's or office-holders political positions or even controversies about him/her, I could understand the thing. Portray Bill Clinton as Pepe LePew, the unselective womanizing skunk? I get it.

But the Joker is not "socialist" or a symbol of big government. (Obama is not in any way "socialist" either, for that matter.) He is a symbol of anarchy perhaps, though even that is unfair to anarchists. He is simply a clinically insane mass murderer.

And the Joker storyline does not pit him against the police - they are helpless against him. The story pits him against vigilante justice. The poster is an incitement to assassination.

Reading too much into it? This has nagged at me since I first saw the poster. I didn't bring it up until the Republican National Committee adopted the sign in its fundraising.

[ Parent ]
OK... (0.00 / 0)
I appreciate your insight and understand your reasoning here. I have to say that the poster does not elicit the same reaction in me, and I am usually pretty sensitive to racist images...but I can understand your perspective.

See, I'm not always unreasonable. :-)  In fact, my sister just said to me, "when the hell are you just going to become a Democrat, Thomas?!"

Maybe this week :-)

[ Parent ]
And I'll concede that (4.00 / 1)
even if you accept the analysis here, it has absolutely no political legs. I would never try to use this as a campaign issue.
[ Parent ]
I agree in general about joker-- but what do you think of interjecting the term "reparations" into a discussion of health care? (4.00 / 3)

Can you think of a non-racist reason to do so?

"But, in the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false about hope." Si se puede. Yes we can.  
[ Parent ]
Nope. (4.00 / 2)
I can not think of any reason whatsoever for injecting the word 'reparations' into a health care debate except to create fears of massive wealth redistribution based on race.

FWIW, during the 2008 campaign, my partners parents, who live in north Louisiana near the Arkansas border, heard that if Obama was elected that white people would be enslaved.  Seriously..

[ Parent ]
to be crass perhaps but... (0.00 / 0)
Yes.

"Look at the monkey. Look at the silly monkey!"

Ever seen the South Park episode where Johnny Cochran defends Chef in court? If you haven't check it out online. The Chewbacca defense in that episode is one of the best examples of diversionary tactics I have ever seen.

It seems like it's working too. We're discussing reparations and comic books instead of health care.



Bresler for Emperor

[ Parent ]
so better to ignore it (0.00 / 0)
and therefore give it a sort of tacit legitimacy?
[ Parent ]
I think a heck of a lot of legitimacy is being taken away from the issues (0.00 / 0)
by allowing ourselves to be pulled into yet another snore-fest round of name calling with the Right. No wonder the public is losing interest in us.


Bresler for Emperor
[ Parent ]
oh please (0.00 / 0)
The public is losing interest because nothing is getting done. Not because of name calling - but because of a slavish devotion to the false god of bipartisanship - and general spinelessness.  
[ Parent ]
I think it's a little of both (0.00 / 0)
Sure the public is annoyed because nothing is getting done. They also get pretty bored with the name calling and tune it out pretty darn quick. The more we go around in circles discussing how horrible the Republicans are the less attention we pay to the issues and the less we get done.

It a vicious circle and the upshot is we are spending our political capital on accomplishing nothing. If we don't change our tactic PDQ then November is not going to go our way.

Bresler for Emperor

[ Parent ]
name calling (0.00 / 0)
isn't what is going to cause election losses in November.

Lack of action is. Name calling didn't create the inaction.  

[ Parent ]
OK, those are both true statements (0.00 / 0)
It just seems to me that spending mass amounts of time wrapped up in discussions of name calling and other diversions from the issues doesn't seem like a good use of resources, what with some tough races on our hands this cycle, plummeting public support and all.  

Bresler for Emperor
[ Parent ]
My apologies for (4.00 / 1)
preventing you from posting a diary about health care, bozo.
[ Parent ]
Seen clowns on a lot of free stater stuff, you calling me a Nazi? (0.00 / 0)
Just kidding Elwood. Now that you bring it up I did get a lot of good ideas for one from the Hampsters today.

Bresler for Emperor
[ Parent ]
You're crazy elwood. (4.00 / 2)
Racism? Please.

Don't be so sensitive about political humor.

Is "Racist" the Correct Term for the GOP ? | 30 comments
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