# "Obama is a chimp" Tea Party Republican is sorry if anyone was offended by her harmless satire. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [April 30, 2011, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320 "2011-04-30T21:53:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![SSgtBaloo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ac91a4/32.png) [@SSgtBaloo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SSgtBaloo)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/41 "2011-05-01T01:55:08Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > I say let all the racists fly their little freak flags. It’s easier to spot them that way. And _that’s_ why freedom of speech is so important! ---
**Author:** ![marshmallow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@marshmallow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/marshmallow)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/42 "2011-05-01T01:58:47Z")
Obama as a chimp doesn’t work very well. He’s more of a Vulcan, if anything. The depictions of him as Satan work because he’s smooth and suave, which lines up with portrayals of the Devil in the 20th century. The watermelon gag on the Whitehouse lawn was pretty decent actually. I haven’t heard much outcry over stations that portray Obama playing basketball though, sometimes with CGI clips. That’s really going low. :eek: ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/43 "2011-05-01T01:58:47Z")
> [@OtakuLoki](#): > > **magellan01** , in what way has she been kicked off the island? She’s saying her constituents support her and that she plans to remain right where she is, in spite of several calls for her to resign. They’re gonna all chip in and get her a real nice white sheet with eye holes and everything 😃 ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/44 "2011-05-01T02:00:32Z")
> [@xtisme](#): > > You shouldn’t bother then, Steve. Ok…so, it would be ok for a black guy to put up an image of Obama photo-shopped as a chimp then? What about a Hispanic guy? Would it be ok for me to put up an image of Obama as a chimp, or would that be out as well? Am I only allowed to put up such an image if the president is Hispanic? > > Since you aren’t going to bother and all, I guess you won’t answer, but how do you know that every image of Bush as Chimp was done by white people? Do you guys have some sort of recognition signals that allow you to know each others work? Something that doesn’t work on us minority types? Is this the same signal that allows you guys to get bank loans and the like? > > -XT It’s the hive mind, kind of like the Borg. We all have it. ---
**Author:** ![eleanorigby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ee7513/32.png) [@eleanorigby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eleanorigby)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/45 "2011-05-01T02:09:33Z")
Bush used to (and for all I know, still does–it’s just his level, humor-wise) poke fun at himself as a chimp. I know I’ve seen footage of him making the “ooh, ooh, eeh!” chimp noises and forming his mouth to resemble a chimp’s. I really doubt Obama has ever done likewise. This little Republican lady knows exactly what she was doing. It’s a bit ballsy of her to call herself a Christian, but I’m not surprised that she thinks she is–and she may well be: a racist person who claims she follows the teachings of Jesus Christ. Yeah. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/46 "2011-05-01T02:20:13Z")
> [@](#): > > I do not believe that an American adult, able to survive day to day without assistance, could fail to have known, in advance, that an interpretation of racist meaning and intent was inevitable. This. Either she’s lying through her teeth, in which case she’s insulting the public’s intelligence (granted, the general public’s intelligence isn’t that high), in which case she shouldn’t be a public servant, or she’s so damned stupid herself that she shouldn’t even be in charge of her own life, let alone be in charge of other people’s lives. She’s old enough, or at least she looks old enough, to remember when blacks were openly called chimps and monkeys and worse, so even if SHE didn’t intend for it to be racist, she should have known enough about the public that she claims to represent to know that OTHER people would have seen it as racist. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/47 "2011-05-01T02:25:08Z")
[QUOTE=Simplicio] Really? I don’t really have a problem with images of Obama as a clown, or a rat or whatever other unflattering thing people want to use. I certainly don’t find it repugnant People using crazy charactatures of political figures to express their opposition to them is a pretty longstanding tradition, you can see several of them a week in political cartoons. And for the same reason I don’t have a problem with people depicting Bush as a chimp. [/QUOTE] I think if you have to resort to any sort of demeaning imagery (and a chimp is MUCH more demeaning than a clown, regardless of who it’s being applied too) that you have lowered yourself to a similar level, regardless of the color of the person you are trying to demean. The image of a chimp is so powerful because it captures the caricature of being a subhuman. I think it’s demeaning if it’s used on a white person or a black person, or any other type of person. It’s racially charged when used against a black person, obviously, because of the racial baggage associated with it. And for that reason, the folks linked in the OP are going to get blasted for it…and rightfully so. But I don’t find it ok to use that same imagery against a white person just because they are white, and so that makes it ok. Personally, I think that by the liberals (some on this board) making it ok and acceptable to use that imagery against Bush, it’s going to make the uproar about this same tactic being used against Obama weaker than it might have otherwise have been. It smacks, as I said earlier, as a double standard…even when, as you and others have pointed out, there is a lot of historical baggage about the subject wrt blacks in history and how they have been portrayed. Perhaps it would have been wiser not to start down that path and go for the lowest imagery possible in your collective efforts to discredit Bush? Or, perhaps it will work out, as when exactly the same imagery is used it will be portrayed as completely racist, and this will discredit the Tea Party in the eyes of the moderates who might swing that way? > [@](#): > > But theres a subset of those charactatures that have a strong history of transmitting a message thats not just unflattering, but racist. And so whether its “fair” or not, using those on black people will be pretty universally regarded as not just mocking a black politician, but as mocking their race. Communication depends on context, especially satire or humor, and when people draw Obama as a chimp, they’re communicating something different then when they draw Bush as a chimp, or Obama as a clown. You are probably right there. And it probably WILL be portrayed that way…and, most likely it WAS racially motivated or had racist components in it. It still smacks of ‘people in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones’, but then I’ve been watching this continuous partisan bickering for years now, as both sides seem hell bent on one upping each other to see how low they can go, so that might be coloring my own perceptions. When I see 'dopers all in a righteous fury over the same images used against Obama as were used against Bush, the first thing I think of isn’t ‘racist’…it’s ‘another round of partisan politics’. It’s hard for me to see Obama as not just a politician I voted for (and plan on voting for again…it’s ironic to me that I might be one of the few in this thread who actually think he’s doing a great job) and respect, but as a ‘black man’. I see him as just a ‘man’, and only think about the ‘black’ part when I see threads like this. -XT ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/48 "2011-05-01T02:35:20Z")
Look, if you want to have an argument about the advisability of partisan politics, i’d be happy to do that elsewhere. In my opinion, though, arguing that this is simply a case of both sides engaging in partisan politics is engaging in false equivalency. Yes, there is partisan politics at play on both sides, and there are many reasonable arguments about why that’s a bad thing. But the point here is not that both sides engage in partisan politics—i agree that they do—but that one side’s partisan politics is currently making significant use of racist imagery. You say that you understand the historical issues about equating blacks to apes and monkeys; you acknowledge that people portraying a black man as a chimp are communicating something about race; you even acknowledge that race is most likely central to this particular incident. Yet this is still, for you, not really about race, but about how both sides are just as partisan as one another. I just don’t understand how you can draw this conclusion. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/49 "2011-05-01T02:52:57Z")
[QUOTE=mhendo] You say that you understand the historical issues about equating blacks to apes and monkeys; you acknowledge that people portraying a black man as a chimp are communicating something about race; you even acknowledge that race is most likely central to this particular incident. Yet this is still, for you, not really about race, but about how both sides are just as partisan as one another. I just don’t understand how you can draw this conclusion. [/QUOTE] I guess, for me, that racism doesn’t trump everything else. It’s not ok to me that the same imagery was used for non-racial purposes and used for racist purposes. One doesn’t trump the other…they are both bad. I disliked when this stuff was used against Bush, even though (contrary to popular believe) I didn’t like Bush very much and found him a boob. I don’t like it when it’s used against Obama, not because chimp used to equal black person, but for the same reason…because it’s being used to demean a man and try and paint him as a subhuman, and so attempt to win some sort of victory by association. Or whatever the fuck these sorts of things are supposed to prove or show…mostly, that instead of trying to debate the issues and demonstrate through logic or reason that the person in question is right or wrong on the issues, instead to just jump to insulting caricatures. I don’t know…maybe gonzo was right and I need to shut the fuck up and take a nap or something. I’m not saying any of this very well, and I can practically feel the hostility I’m getting from all of this. Plus, I DO think that the images were racially motivated, and while I don’t think that trumps everything, I think it’s uncalled for in America today, and should be stomped on with both feet…then kicked in the nuts driven over several times, buried in an ant-hill and liberally doused with honey. I want us to be beyond all this racist bullshit, but it doesn’t look like that’s going to happen in my lifetime. -XT ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 2:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/50 "2011-05-01T02:53:48Z")
> [@Marilyn Davenport](#): > > “I think it is only racist when the intent in my heart is racist, and that was not my intent.” Just classic. Almost, but not quite as good as the claim in a recent Dope thread that _saying_ bigoted things does not make you a bigot unless you _act_ on them. > [@](#): > > She said that none of her black friends had complained about the email… Another classic. It’s amazing how these people wind up with so many adoring ethnic friends who are willing to ignore or defend the flagrant racist shit they get into. The following on the other hand is just bizarre. > [@mhendo](#): > > She also, as former state GOP Chair Michael Schroeder [pointed out](http://blogs.ocweekly.com/navelgazing/2011/04/racist_orange_county_republica.php?page=2), supported “former Newport Beach City Councilman Dick Nichols, who stated that he was voting against putting in more grass at Corona del Mar’s beach because, he said, there were already ‘too many Mexicans on the beach.’” In most coastal areas, aren’t they concerned about keeping enough _sand_ at the beach? Sheesh. Sorry **xtisme** , there _is_ a "double standard’ when it comes to crude insults with obvious racial/bigoted overtones directed against historically threatened and abused ethnic minorities, as opposed to crude insults against members of other groups. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/51 "2011-05-01T03:00:02Z")
The reason the Bush cartoons were not racist is because he was white. That does make a difference XT. The fact that Obama is black, means they are racist. If you don’t believe showing Obama as a chimp is not, you are lost. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 3:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/52 "2011-05-01T03:15:12Z")
[http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42656911/ns/politics-more\_politics/](http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42656911/ns/politics-more_politics/) The Republican county seat asked the woman who sent the cartoon to resign. He said it is well known and historically racist to show blacks as chimps. No Bush would not be the same thing. ---
**Author:** ![gravitycrash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@gravitycrash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gravitycrash)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 3:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/53 "2011-05-01T03:16:50Z")
Shame on her for assuming that any e-mail will remain private. In the mean time, call the thought police, someone needs re-education. Also I predict this thread will be 6 pages by the time I wake up in the morning. Get all good and outraged guys because this is the most important thing ever. ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/54 "2011-05-01T03:29:46Z")
> [@xtisme](#): > > I guess, for me, that racism doesn’t trump everything else. It’s not ok to me that the same imagery was used for non-racial purposes and used for racist purposes. One doesn’t trump the other…they are both bad. I guess that’s where we’ll have to disagree, because for me, even if they are both bad, one is distinctly worse than the other. To draw an analogy, i think it’s sort of like a white guy and a black guy arguing with one another. Both of them might be assholes, and you might be able to say that each one is as big an asshole as the other as long as they’re calling each other “asshole” and “dick” and “motherfucker” and “douchebag.” But if the white guy calls the black guy a nigger, that fundamentally changes things, in my opinion. And there’s no real equivalency even possible in the other direction, for the historical reasons that we’ve been discussing in this thread. ---
**Author:** ![tnetennba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7993a0/32.png) [@tnetennba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tnetennba)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 4:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/55 "2011-05-01T04:13:19Z")
> [@gravitycrash](#): > > n the mean time, call the thought police, someone needs re-education. Maybe in the morning after you slog through all the posts you can tell us what this means. ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/56 "2011-05-01T04:25:54Z")
> [@xtisme](#): > > You shouldn’t bother then, Steve. Ok…so, it would be ok for a black guy to put up an image of Obama photo-shopped as a chimp then? What about a Hispanic guy? Would it be ok for me to put up an image of Obama as a chimp, or would that be out as well? Am I only allowed to put up such an image if the president is Hispanic? > > Since you aren’t going to bother and all, I guess you won’t answer, but how do you know that every image of Bush as Chimp was done by white people? Do you guys have some sort of recognition signals that allow you to know each others work? Something that doesn’t work on us minority types? Is this the same signal that allows you guys to get bank loans and the like? > > -XT If the Pres was a Hispanic and you posted him in a sombrero , laying on the ground eating a taco, you would be going in the right direction. It would not get you there though. Do you really not get it? ---
**Author:** ![Hippy\_Hollow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hippy_hollow/32/4841_2.png) [@Hippy\_Hollow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hippy_Hollow)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 4:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/57 "2011-05-01T04:29:44Z")
I guess this confounds me on some level, because racists don’t feel they can be racist anymore. Seriously, this bat’s contortioning to claim that she, in fact, thought this was satire in good fun, and is gobsmacked to find that the PC police are calling her a Klanswoman! It’s just not fair, etc. I’m trying to think of the legal, economic, and social consequences of being a racist. If you don’t hire, or injure people because of their race, you get into trouble. In some fields, people won’t want you to work for them, or might fire you. You might lose friends as well… But to me, this applies to only a sliver of the American populace (like people in Hollywood). I have no doubt that this woman, given where she lives, her socioeconomic status, and her political affiliation (granted, this is all assumed, but I feel safe in making these assumptions) will not suffer in the slightest being outed as a racist. The opprobrium headed her way she’ll no doubt filter as “PC leftist socialists,” and she’s played the God card - and by standing her ground she will gain the admiration of red-blooded 'Merkuns who think it’s great that she had the courage to criticize our foreign-born, Muslim, Nazi-influenced president. Who is also a negro. So why is she trying so hard to deny it? Racism doesn’t bother me so much anymore, it’s the pathetic lengths idiots go to pretending they’re _not_ racist. ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/58 "2011-05-01T04:46:54Z")
> [@xtisme](#): > > And had all this happened before the Bush presidency I’d say you are right. But that well has been so completely poisoned and so much hate and venom were released during those 10 years that it’s going to be hard for me to see the moral high ground here. I DO get that showing Obama as a chimp is a racial slur. And for all I know that’s exactly what the fuckheads who commissioned this had in mind. But under all that is the question…why was it ok to do this continuously about Bush for years on end, but it’s not ok to do it against Obama? Because Bush is white anything goes? Because Obama is black he needs to be treated with a different standard of political attack and satire? Why? The subtext for Bush as Monkey is “this is guy is an idiot, he makes poor decisions, he’s an imbecile with power like a monkey with a gun” The subtext for Obama as Monkey is generally “this guy is a black subhuman” Similarly, the intent behind opposing the Iraq war or hating Bush over the Patriot act is a reaction to his decisions, the huge wave of vitriolic “he’s a secret muslim” type stuff that appeared in 2007 before anyone even knew what Obama stood for is because of what he is. Ironically the same defense is given to both types of dichotomies “Oh, it’s alright when you guys do it, right!?!?” as if Iraq war protesting and birtherism have the same validity. Edit: FTR I thought Bush as chimp was stupid and distasteful and the worst crime of all: not even funny. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Jeffrey\_Lebowski](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_jeffrey_lebowski/32/215_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Jeffrey\_Lebowski](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Jeffrey_Lebowski)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/59 "2011-05-01T04:55:36Z")
I always thought that the Bush as a monkey caricature merely had to do with the size of his ears - even when he wasn’t drawn as a chimp in most cartoons his ears would be accentuated. ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2011, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320/60 "2011-05-01T05:30:13Z")
> [@Hippy\_Hollow](#): > > So why is she trying so hard to deny it? Because while violating the law can have some trivial repercussions, violating custom can be devastating socially. There are almost no racists who claim the badge with pride; even people like David Duke strongly deny that they’ve got a racist bone in their bodies. Being a racist is ugly, and society doesn’t accept racists anymore. That’s why all the racists we do see, have to use some sort of dodge or set of dodges in order to avoid stating the pure, obvious truth. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-is-a-chimp-tea-party-republican-is-sorry-if-anyone-was-offended-by-her-harmless-satire/580320.md?page=4)