Staring into the Abyss

I don't know much about The New Yorker magazine. I've never thumbed through its pages, nor perused its website, assuming it has one. I know one Seymour Hersh contributes to it from time to time, and I do know his work to be rather comprehensive, so I figured it to uphold a reputable reputation. Two days ago, I was rather surprised, as I imagine may others were, when I learned of its caricature of Mr. and Mrs. Barack Obama adorning its front cover for the world to see. There he was, our beloved Barack Hussein Obama, clad in traditional Muslim garb, greeting his heavily-armed better half with the "terrorist fist pump". Many witnesses stood (or sat) aghast: how could this magazine, friend to civil liberties, denigrate followers of the Islamic faith in such a manner, not to mention the would-be successor to America's throne? The magazine's brain-trust, in its defense, claimed it a satirical depiction of how many citizens view this man, though few were buying it, chiding this action for its lack of sensitivity.

I, myself, upon learning of this, sat stupefied. For a moment, as I gazed upon this image, I thought I had flipped open the Sun to see one of Donato's spoofs; then I blinked and saw it was The New Yorker, this beacon of liberal journalism! Suffice to say, however, I couldn't figure out where I stood. On the one hand, I am a fan of satire, thus I can understand the motivation of the editorial staff; on the other, I sympathize with those who have grown awfully tired of seeing, time and time again, the same tyrannical stereotype being purported through Western media. After allowing this to retreat to the nether recesses of my mind, the following phrase popped into my frontal lobe this morning:

They said what many of us think.

I will admit, it was a crass move on the part of The New Yorker to publish this cartoon, but as the truth surfaces after such a long period of captivity, toes are trampled and hearts are broken. The truth, as demonstrated by our friends at this renowned magazine, is that, contrary to our general belief, racism is alive and well, this time in the form of Islamophobia. Try as we did to put it behind us by declaring it a problem of the past, here it is, staring at us in the face, like the eyes of a hungry mountain lion. As insensitive as this action was to followers of the Muslim faith, as well as to Mr. and Mrs. Obama, it shines the spotlight squarely on our deep-seeded fears. Like the depictions of the Prophet Muhammad in the Danish newspaper - and again by Ezra Levant in his Western Standard - it says to the world that us White folk are still afraid of any being with a face not resembling our own.

I can't say I would have ever made as bold and brash a statement as the one gracing the front cover of The New Yorker, but before I grab my sack of feathers and bucket of tar, I have to stop and reflect. The way I see it, this cartoon serves as a mirror, revealing the inconvenient abyss lying within each and every one of us. Beyond our awareness resides that implicit fear of the outsider - that foreign person, that alien concept - that which we cannot quite understand. Sadly, for us, the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s did not wash it away (by and large, Whitey remains apprehensive of the Black population), nor did the Suffrage movement of the early twentieth century. It's a shame, being shrouded in ignorance even after all that toil and sacrifice by so many.

We can cry foul all we want - we can even hurl rocks at the offices of The New Yorker, though I highly recommend against doing so - and it will do nothing about our own ignorant fear and loathing. If there is a silver lining on this dark cloud cast over us, it is the fact that this ignorance of ours rendered itself in a form for all to see, should we choose to see it. Passing judgment only serves to distance ourselves from our own problems, rather than confront and vanquish them (see John 8:7, if you're a fan of Christian folklore).

This racist piece, as some have deemed it, came to light because of our own inherent racism, the racism we are afraid to address because we want so badly to believe it dead and gone. Well, it's here, and it's not about to venture out of our lives anytime soon, so long as we deny its existence within the very fabric that holds together our society, eating away at its foundation like a ravenous virus.

Fear not, for we can rid ourselves of it; the first step is acknowledging its presence.