Salman Rushdie - Avoid politeness, Ctd

Salman Rushdie by Ralph Steadman

In a conversation with Christopher Hitchens, Salman Rushdie said that respect proper means that you can take someone seriously and still disagree with them:

"One of the most mealy mouthed pieces of language that has developed to justify this kind of behaviour is a kind of reinvention of the meaning of the word "respect". It seemed to me when I was growing up that respect meant that you took people seriously. It didn’t mean that you never disagreed with them. To respect someone is to say we’ll take on what you have to say and if I don’t agree with it I will offer a counter argument. The idea that it would be disrespectful to someone in any way disagree from this system of belief is a new idea, is a new meaning of the term "respect" and it seems to me to have nothing to do with respect. And what it actually means is I am too afraid to do it. So what you have is cowardice masquerading as respect. And that’s become more and more common. It’s very clear in the case of the [Danish] cartoons."

I'm a cartoonist, it's my job to create "brutal" and "bilious" cartoons

A self-portrait by Martin Rowson with a skewered Prime Minister, David Cameron

We artists live under a convention. We have a license to offend. A warrant and a commission to eviscerate people with a pen. Robert G. Ingersoll said:

"The instance we admit that a book is too sacred to be debated or even reasoned about, we are mental serfs."

"Tout Est Pardonné" - The Charlie Hebdo front cover and Christopher Hitchens on cartooning the prophet

In 2006 the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten, cartoonist Kurt Westergaard and the people of Denmark were subjected to a coordinated campaign of intimidation, sabotage and murder following the publication earlier in 2005 of the image of the prophet of Muhammed. Christopher Hitchens wrote in response, ‘The case for mocking religion’:

"There is a strong case for saying that the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten, and those who have reprinted its efforts out of solidarity, are affirming the right to criticize not merely Islam but religion in general."

Matt and how he works

Matt Pritchett explaining how he produced his first front page cartoon

Matt is a pocket cartoonist. Son of Oliver and grandson of V.S. Pritchett. Celebrated for his inimitable wit and bite delivered daily, without fail, in illustrated form. As a pocket cartoonist he is one among a "diminishing species" according to Andy Davey. Matt’s big break came on Thursday February 23 1988, the date he first appeared on the front cover of the Telegraph, as above. He explained it like this: 

"I did a cartoon of two people and the line ‘I hope I have a better Thursday than I did yesterday’, which sort of went with the general mood of crisis of the readers."

Herb Block - The coiner of "McCarthyism"

In this video interview (at 8m25) Herb Block explains how he cointed the famous terms, "McCarthyism".

"Yea [I invented McCarthyism], apparently so. That's the first use made of that word that I know of. I remember how it originated, because they wanted to put something on that top barrel, and you couldn't call it McCarthy himself, and you wouldn't say 'McCarthy techniques" or so on. I thought well we could maybe use just one word, "McCarthyism". And it caught on."

Video in full here.

Martin Rowson on William Hogarth

To celebrate the 300th anniversary of the Hanoverian period, Radio 3 presented a mix of essays on key figures of the Georgian era. Writer and political cartoonist Martin Rowson provided an essay on the satiric genius of William Hogarth and his lasting influence on the development of the political cartoon. His essay wrote:

"In his history of the first Australian penal settlements, "The Fatal Shore", the art critic Robert Hughes described the standard modern perception of Georgian England thus: 

"A passing reference to violence, dirt and gin; a nod in the direction of the scaffold; a highwayman or two, a drunken judge, and some whores for local colour; but the rest is all curricles and fanlights. Modern squalor is squalid but Georgian squalor is ‘Hogarthian’, an art form in itself." 

Note that adjective. By now it’s so well entrenched we instinctively know what it means, though it’s probably not the meaning Hogarth himself would have wanted. He had definite ambitions for his name to be associated with his practice, and yet the paint strokes or engraved lines and slashes aren’t, of themselves, "Hogarthian". 

And however much he wanted - pretty successfully - to found an entirely new school of British art, there’s nothing really "Hogarthian" in his proto-impressionist study "The Shrimp Girl" or in his innovatively realistic portrait of the philanthropic sea-captain Thomas Corum, or his portrait of David Garrick or his murals in the Inns of Court or for Bart’s Hospital. These are all by Hogarth, for sure; they might even be "Hogarthish"; but

Ian Knox cartoons and political correctness as censorship, Ctd

[DISCLAIMER: When I speak of loyalists I do not speak of all loyalists. I speak of a small violent minority]*

[DISCLAIMER: I am an equal opportunities adversary and I hold violent republicans in equal contempt to violent loyalists]*

It's well documented that Ian Knox draws loyalists and loyalist paramilitaries as knuckle-dragging empty-heads. It nothing new. He's been doing it for decades. By doing this he adheres to two codes. 

Firstly, he is adhering to the unwritten convention of the political cartoonist. It is their job to be cutting and incisive and even to offend. 

Secondly, he is adhering to speaking plain English. To calling a stone-throwing thug a stone-throwing-thug. And the beauty of political cartoons is that they're super-distilled plain English. As John Gilroy, creator of the Guinness posters, said:

"The man in the street has no time for contemplation. My posters are therefore, a kind of aesthetic meal-in-a-minute."

Arm folding and mirror holding, Ctd Northern Ireland needs Ian Knox and more satirists

Ian Knox from today's @irish_news. I really do wish the BBC would put his stuff back on TV again. We need him. pic.twitter.com/DsxDUFg6xD
— Alex.Kane (@AlexKane221b) January 8, 2014

In an article 'Comedy as a Weapon' published in The American Thinker, the power and influence of US political cartoonist Herb Block was explained:

"Thanks to people like Herb Block and his ilk, McCarthy became an American laughingstock, allowing communism and socialism to become "cool" in Hollywood, while Conservatives became unofficially "blacklisted." Sixty years later his methods of using humor and sarcasm for social influence are a template for those still seeking to destroy conservative values."

Herb Block popularised the term "McCarthyism" and through his cutting cartoons managed to discredit and pull down the entire edifice of the McCarthy enterprise, as he did with the cartoon above which helped Herb Block to win the Pulitzer Prize.

Arm Folding and Mirror Holding, Ctd

Love how #CreepingSharia amply demonstrates that there is no Defence more English than taking this piss out of extremists. Of any stripe...
— Andrew Haydon (@Postcards_Gods) April 16, 2012

Being able to mock, laugh and ridicule power is a distinctively British tradition. Britain is after all the mother of the free world. Classical British liberalism is what informed the American Constitution and the First Amendment which gives American a complete right to free speech. Britain gifted America Habeus Corpus. The Britain John Milton made the classic case for free speech in his pamphlet Areopagitica. David Allen Green said:

"Being able to openly ridicule and mock those in power – or seeking power – is perhaps a more important right than many realise."

George Orwell knew that England and the English could never fall to fascism as the people instictively laugh at ostentatious acts of power. He said in England Your England:

Arm folding and mirror holding, Ctd The power of the political cartoonist

Menzies Campbell said:

"Cartoons are a traditional feature of British political coverage and the cartoonist's pen stroke has often conveyed judgments more deadly than anything journalists would dare to express."

They're called "ink-stained assassins" for a reason, as The News Statesman put it here. As Diane Abbott said:

"The idea of John Major in his underpants: he used that over and over and it became part of the political lexicon. It spoke of his timidity, caution and greyness."

Likewise, of Ed Miliband, Tim Benson wrote in the book 'The Best of Britain's Political Cartoons 2013':

"[Peter] Brooke's believes that [Ed Miliband's] comparison with Wallace has damaged Miliband's chances of ever becoming prime minister. This is because, like Wallace, Miliband's also appears hapless, making the public's perception of him unsuitable prime ministerial material."