Thursday, August 15, 2013



How can anyone with a sense of humour censor Tom and Jerry as racist?

Picture this gloriously silly scene from a Tom And Jerry cartoon. In a jungle clearing, trapped in a steaming cauldron, is Tom the cat. He’s the prisoner of Jerry the mouse, who is perched on the pot’s rim.

With a bone tied between his ears, a grass skirt, and his fur blackened with soot, Jerry is waving a little spear and pretending to be a cannibal.

‘Peel dem potatoes!’ he roars, and Tom obeys miserably. ‘Chop dem carrots,’ bellows Jerry, and the cat adds them to the hot water he’s stewing in. Then he reaches for an onion. ‘Hold de onion!’ barks Jerry.

What’s wrong with that picture? Logically, just about everything — the mouse is talking, the cat is dicing vegetables and is terrified, despite his kitchen knife being much bigger than Jerry’s spear… and anyway, a cannibal mouse would eat mice, not cats. It’s perfect nonsense.

Even if you’re a Tom And Jerry fan, you might not have seen that cannibal scene. It’s from a 1951, seven-minute cartoon called His Mouse Friday, where the duo get shipwrecked on a desert island, like Robinson Crusoe. It is never shown on TV now, for fear of causing racial offence.

The problem isn’t so much Jerry’s deep-fried accent, or that when the real cannibals show up, they’re talking hep Fifties jive, like jazz stars Duke Ellington and Sammy Davis Jr. No, the problem is the soot.

Jerry rubs his face and body with soot from the cauldron to disguise himself. He blacks up.

Blacking up, sometimes called blackface, is forbidden in the 21st century. It’s so unbearably racist that we are never allowed to see it. Not only our children but all of us, the whole of society, must be protected from the mind-polluting horror of witnessing a cartoon mouse blacked up with soot.

That’s why the next Tom And Jerry Blu-ray disc from cartoon giant Warner Bros — the Golden Collection Volume Two — will be missing two episodes originally scheduled for inclusion.

And two less controversial episodes that were pencilled in for the Blu-ray series have now been dropped. One is Casanova Cat, from 1951, where Tom blackens Jerry’s face by blowing cigar smoke at him. The other is Mouse Cleaning, a 1948 short in which Tom tries to talk his way out of trouble while his face is blacked up in coal dust.

Source

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

For many blacks, and their guilt-ridden, self-loathing, White liberal enablers, the word "racism" has become big business. For blacks, it's like winning the lottery, except when they "claim" racism, they have (very) little chance of losing. It's usually a major payday, since most companies, govt. agencies, etc. would rather simply hand them a bunch of money than risk bad publicity. It sure beats working.

Dean said...

When viewing life through the dark glasses of racism everything is offensive, even the silliness of Tom and Jerry.

What's next? Banning Tom and Jerry completely because those who love cats might be offended by the way Tom is presented as a buffoon?

Perhaps that shouldn't be mentioned. Someone somewhere will decide it's a good idea.

Anonymous said...

Future generations will have a laugh or just cry!

Anonymous said...

Here's a thought, if you don't like what your watching TURN THE F'N CHANNEL!

There in lies the difference between conservatives and liberals, if conservatives don't like something they don't watch it, while liberals want it banned!

Anonymous said...

"When any government, or any church for that matter, undertakes to say to its subjects, This you may not read, this you must not see, this you are forbidden to know, the end result is tyranny and oppression no matter how holy the motives."

- Robert Heinlein

Grumpy 60 Gear Old said...

"if conservatives don't like something they don't watch it, while liberals want it banned!"

Bullshit. This liberal does not watch Faux News. I don't care if you watch it or not. I don't care if you go to tea bagger rallies. I don't care if you were hit by an out of control dump truck. You can do whatever the hell you like except standing on my lawn. I draw the line there. Get off my lawn!

Anonymous said...

You watch Faux news? You must be referring to MSNBC.

Anonymous said...

Forgive him. Grumpy is obviously old and senile, which is what qualifies him to be a liberal. Drink your Kool-Aid now old timer.

Anonymous said...

"You watch Faux news?"

Can't you fricking read?

Anonymous said...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/dc-politics/gray-made-the-call-to-cut-donnie-mcclurkin-from-concert-at-martin-luther-king-jr-memorial/2013/08/12/5aa443ac-039c-11e3-88d6-d5795fab4637_story.html

Anonymous said...

"then do tell why its only liberals you see whining about this kind of thing and demanding it be banned?"

Because you hear about the most vocal libs, just like we hear about the most vocal right wingers (see rightwingwatch.org). It does not take a genius to figure that one out.