Hangknot, slipknot
Sometimes things just grate you the wrong way. This time, it's out of history.
Now, normally history and me, we get along great. But when it comes to antisemitism, I don't tolerate it so well. (This coming from someone in the process of editing a novel dealing with Germany today and its relationship to the Shoah, but I digress.) Anyway, I'm reading a book called April '65: Confederate Covert Action in the American Civil War by William A. Tidwell, and it's got some great visual media from the time. Well, here's a closeup of one of them, labeled for your convenience:
(This cartoon has a page at the Library of Congress that explains the context. Basically, this is after Lincoln's assassination [he even makes a cameo here, being borne up to Heaven], showing a bunch of Confederates mourning the lynched Confederate President Jefferson Davis. Its subtitle: "Finale of the Jeff Davis 'Die-Nasty.'")
Okay, so some Yank is expressing his vitriol against the Confederacy- completely justifiable. But take another look at what's supposed to be Judah P. Benjamin, considered "the brains of the Confederacy" and serving variously as the Confederate Attorney General, Secretary of War, and Secretary of War- and incidentally, a Jew. Don't see it yet? Have a gander at a photo of Benjamin:
Maybe I'm just getting paranoid in my old age, but Mr. Burgoo Zac (I kid you not, that's what the artist signed as!) has gone beyond caricature to antisemitism. Look at the shnoz he gave the poor guy! Yes, yes, the centennial of this cartoon came and went before I was even born. But it still gets under my skin.
Now, normally history and me, we get along great. But when it comes to antisemitism, I don't tolerate it so well. (This coming from someone in the process of editing a novel dealing with Germany today and its relationship to the Shoah, but I digress.) Anyway, I'm reading a book called April '65: Confederate Covert Action in the American Civil War by William A. Tidwell, and it's got some great visual media from the time. Well, here's a closeup of one of them, labeled for your convenience:
(This cartoon has a page at the Library of Congress that explains the context. Basically, this is after Lincoln's assassination [he even makes a cameo here, being borne up to Heaven], showing a bunch of Confederates mourning the lynched Confederate President Jefferson Davis. Its subtitle: "Finale of the Jeff Davis 'Die-Nasty.'")
Okay, so some Yank is expressing his vitriol against the Confederacy- completely justifiable. But take another look at what's supposed to be Judah P. Benjamin, considered "the brains of the Confederacy" and serving variously as the Confederate Attorney General, Secretary of War, and Secretary of War- and incidentally, a Jew. Don't see it yet? Have a gander at a photo of Benjamin:
Maybe I'm just getting paranoid in my old age, but Mr. Burgoo Zac (I kid you not, that's what the artist signed as!) has gone beyond caricature to antisemitism. Look at the shnoz he gave the poor guy! Yes, yes, the centennial of this cartoon came and went before I was even born. But it still gets under my skin.