Cartooning for dummies...

So, if you haven't already heard about the Danish cartoon scandal, you either a) live under a rock, b) need to start reading the newspaper, or c) probably live a blissfully ignorant existence. Either way, rather than recount the whole messy incident, let's just say that a Danish paper printed a bunch of rude comics depicting Muslims in pretty nasty ways. Free speech...uproar in the Muslim world...yada yada yada…you know how this story goes.

This is not a funny story. But what is funny, is that today, a leading paper in Iran, the Hamshahri, announced that in retaliation to the dirty Danish doodles, it will be launching its own contest for the best cartoon about the Holocaust. As part of its rationale, the paper asks:

"Does Western free speech allow working on issues like America and Israel's crimes or an incident like the Holocaust or is this freedom of speech only good for insulting the holy values of divine religions?"

So why, you ask, do I find this funny? Well, for many reasons. First, I find it funny that the retaliatory act against a Danish newspaper is to seek cartoons about the Holocaust. How are these two things at all commensurate? After all, it wasn’t a Jewish newspaper that printed cartoons that defamed the Prophet…

The other thing that I find really funny about the contest, is that by construing it as a test of Western free speech, the paper seems to be implying that anti-Semitism and holocaust denial would be outside the norm of its usual messaging. Thing is, it’s no secret that in Iran – and many other countries in the Middle East – anti-Semitism is pretty common, and Jew-hating, Israel-bashing cartoons are a regular part of the public sphere. Let's be honest- they don't need a contest to find the stuff. (Click here for some recent examples.)

Anyways…someone needs to call Art Spiegelman and tell him to forward the fine folks at Hamshahri a copy of Maus. As far as Holocaust cartoons go, I think his is pretty fantastic.

And in other news...

Wanna see some really funny (non-political) cartoons? Go to www.planbfunnies.com