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REUTERS: New York Times Under Fire For 'Homophobic' Cartoon Of Trump And Putin

Redhead On Moped

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Note: title from article

JULY 17, 2018 / 8:51 PM

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...obic-cartoon-of-trump-and-putin-idUSKBN1K802J

Here is an excerpt.

A viral cartoon depicting Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin as gay lovers has been condemned as "homophobic", with mental health charities warning it sent a negative message to vulnerable young LGBT people.

Activists said the satirical animation in the New York Times implied homosexual relationships were shameful or laughable, echoing homophobic bullies and adding to pressure on young people struggling with their gender or sexuality.

The New York Times said the video, which has been viewed more than 1.3 million times on Twitter alone, was "not meant to be homophobic".
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Kim Sanders, head of media engagement at the British charity Stonewall, said the images "reinforce a harmful narrative that being LGBT is inferior or something to be ridiculed".

"Depicting public figures as gay or bi in an attempt to mock them is a damaging trend that needs to stop," Sanders said.

"This isn't political satire, it's just old-fashioned homophobia."

According to The Trevor Project, young lesbian, gay, and bisexual people are more than four times more likely to attempt suicide than their straight peers, while nearly half of all transgender people have attempted suicide.


A study by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released in June found that a third of lesbian, gay and bisexual youth are bullied at school.
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Here is the cartoon in question. Not embedded, due to queerphobic content, but accessible here at your own discretion.

I know its NYT opinion and not regular NYT, but they're better than this. At least, I'd hope so. There are better ways to mock political leaders, ways that don't bring others down. Hopefully, they will keep this in mind in the future.

UPDATE: Here is a post from the thread that explains why some of us find this problematic and why it is valid to feel this way.

BADMAN said:
Ok so here's a general response to this not being homophobic.

It's not homophobic by the standards of what's perceived as homophobia by a lot straight people, but it's still shitty for many gay people.

When you think homophobic, you might think it's about directly attacking gay people or having an obvious agenda of attacking gay people. By that standard this comic certainly isn't homophobic.

What it does do, is it uses the viewer's implicit reaction of men kissing, tweaking nipples, ect. as a way to cause a reaction in the viewer. This reaction is a trigger of disgust or tension in some form. This is derived from a society that still hasn't fully accepted the acts of love between two men as completely normal.

So when I say "man this shit is fucked", I'm not saying that because I think the cartoon is trying to bring us back to the 1950's; I'm saying that it perpetuates a shitty stigma that gay men and women still have to deal with on a daily basis. So no, it's not homophobic, it's just shitty. And I'd appreciate it if people took that into account before saying that lefties get offended by literally everything or any other excuse to invalidate criticism. It's fine if you aren't personally offended by the comic, but at least acknowledge why people might think that it's shitty.
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Skelepuzzle

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Apr 17, 2018
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NYT isn't good for anything.

Edit: To elaborate, since I may have been misunderstood:

From today:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/17/...ackage-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news

A great summary:
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Edit 2: Apparently that NYT article was stealth rewritten. Amazing. I linked it because I read it earlier in the day.

Proof:
DiVSohGW4AEI_YE.jpg
 
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Arc

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Seems like a stretch to say that this is intended to bring down others or disrespect gay people. It's political satire.
 

Deleted member 12790

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Was that made by the people who made I married a Strange Person? The animation style looks super similar.

EDIT: Ah, it WAS! Bill Plympton, I knew that art style was familiar.

Yeah, if you're familiar with Bill Plympton... he's not homophobic.
 
pants

pants

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I mean the whole joke is that he loves Putin, not other men.

Nothing about this implies theres anything wrong with being gay. Unless I missed something subliminal?
 

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pants said:
I mean the whole joke is that he loves Putin, not other men.

Nothing about this implies theres anything wrong with being gay. Unless I missed something subliminal?
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The whole joke is to mock having feelings for another male as less worth it. It's the same shit as with the "cocksucker" jokes and all the blowjobs "jokes" that straight liberals are making lately. They have the undertone of humiliating Trump as if giving a blowjob was something humiliating perse.
 
Terminus

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Things like this really wind up being a litmus test exposing how people feel about homosexuality to begin with.
 
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On the one hand, I see the homophobia in depicting someone as gay in order to mock them. I'm gay and this general practice is indeed insulting.

On the other hand, it's kind of a journalistic responsibility to point out that Trump is Putin's fuck puppet in the most scathing polemical style possible. A vulgar cartoon is a good start.
 
Ombra

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Not seeing it. If it was Hillary , Bill P. would do the same exact cartoon, there is desire in the looks Trump gives Putin, that cartoon gives shape to that love.
 
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Redhead On Moped

Redhead On Moped

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Melkr_ said:
The whole joke is to mock having feelings for another male as less worth it. It's the same shit as with the "cocksucker" jokes and all the blowjobs "jokes" that straight liberals are making lately. They have the undertone of humiliating Trump as if giving a blowjob was something humiliating perse.
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Thank you for wording this better than I could. Though I don't fully agree with you, the problem is that it shows some actions as something to be shamed for, and that is not cool. They could have just as easily made fun of Trump and Putin in a way that doesn't slight marginalized groups.

And again, this is a Reuters piece. If they are writing on it, it means there are valid points to be raised.
 
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Dice

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Literal bedfellows, but yeah I see how it can be misconstrued. Not really the highest brow form of humour in this day and age.
 
Rayne

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Melkr_ said:
The whole joke is to mock having feelings for another male as less worth it. It's the same shit as with the "cocksucker" jokes and all the blowjobs "jokes" that straight liberals are making lately. They have the undertone of humiliating Trump as if giving a blowjob was something humiliating perse.
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Giving a POS a blowjob is something humiliating.
 

TinTuba47

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I think I coulda done without the rainbows and unicorns. Using specific gay iconography could lead to some thinking it was homophobic.
 
Puddington

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Just watched it, is the idea of Trump portrayed as gay an insult to gay people everywhere? Most likely, but I don't think that was the intent.
 
Kirblar

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The idea that any comment, cartoon, or analogy involving Trump's ridiculous admiration for Putin is "homophobic" because it features two men is utterly ridiculous and an example of the Far Right's bullshit in action.
 
PhazonBlonde

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Mona said:
Pretty much

The punchline is them being lovers is worrisome because of political corruption, not because they're men
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I feel like there's a more effective way to do that without going 'lol look at their tongues they're kissing ew". you're supposed to be repulsed by their relationship because of political reasons, but the cartoon is... kind of conflating that revulsion with going over the top with them being in love. It's pretty juvenile.
 
Skelepuzzle

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Kirblar said:
The idea that any comment, cartoon, or analogy involving Trump's ridiculous admiration for Putin is "homophobic" because it features two men is utterly ridiculous and an example of the Far Right's bullshit in action.
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I think it's a matter of effort, wordplay, and creativity, honestly. This was lazy as shit. If you're going to satirize Trump's admiration for Putin you need to do something more witty than this for it to not feel like it's scraping the bottom of the barrel.

If it's just "ha ha he wants to kiss him!" it's just shitty.

And yes, Huelen is a troll and makes disingenuous threads. We all already know that.
 
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Redhead On Moped

Redhead On Moped

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Kirblar said:
The idea that any comment, cartoon, or analogy involving Trump's ridiculous admiration for Putin is "homophobic" because it features two men is utterly ridiculous and an example of the Far Right's bullshit in action.
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Are you implying that people like Amit Paley of The Trevor Project's suicide hotline and those that think like them are spouting "far right bullshit"? That's borderline queersplaining. Of course not every person is going to feel this is homophobic, but to dismiss it just because you don't think it can be is damaging.

Queer people can certainly, validly, feel this is inappropriate and damaging. That is okay and valid for them to do. I'm a queer person, I myself think they they could have mocked the 2 in a much better way that doesn't belittle anyone else.
 

Benjamin

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Melkr_ said:
The whole joke is to mock having feelings for another male as less worth it. It's the same shit as with the "cocksucker" jokes and all the blowjobs "jokes" that straight liberals are making lately. They have the undertone of humiliating Trump as if giving a blowjob was something humiliating perse.
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Or maybe it's that, specifically, Trump giving a blowjob and cocksucking Putin is humiliating because it's exactly the image that is the antithesis of the traditional Republican party?
 
SaintBowWow

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Melkr_ said:
The whole joke is to mock having feelings for another male as less worth it. It's the same shit as with the "cocksucker" jokes and all the blowjobs "jokes" that straight liberals are making lately. They have the undertone of humiliating Trump as if giving a blowjob was something humiliating perse.
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Isn't a dom/sub relationship sort of inherent to oral sex in general? Regardless of genders of either partner, it's an act in which one partner is sticking the others genitals in their mouth in order to pleasure them (I do understand that many people enjoy performing oral sex). I don't think these jokes imply that blowjobs are humiliating, but that the President of the US is subservient to the President of Russia.

Is it a lazy and crass way to make that point? You bet.
 
Arttemis

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Melkr_ said:
The whole joke is to mock having feelings for another male as less worth it. It's the same shit as with the "cocksucker" jokes and all the blowjobs "jokes" that straight liberals are making lately. They have the undertone of humiliating Trump as if giving a blowjob was something humiliating perse.
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BS, that's not what this cartoon depicts.

It is depicting the motivation for the president's complete submission to Russia as intimacy.

If this were a cartoon about Marie la Pen and Putin having an physical relationship due to her subservient attitude toward his agenda, what kind of outage would occur?

If there were a cartoon depicting Macron and Merkel as physically intimate due to some hypothetical political posturing, it wouldn't even blip on anyone's radar.
 
metalslimer

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Nope I really dont see this as homophobic and dont really see this in the same vein as calling someone a cocksucker. This is literally just making fun of trump being so in love with Putin

This is the same shit people tried to pull with Colbert
 
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Midramble said:
But the homosexuality isn't the punchline. The love itself is. Their orientation and gender is irrelevant to the point of the joke. That our compromised president loves a dictator.
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Both are macho windbags who probably think gay equals emasculated. And there is a long and vile tradition of calling people gay to brand them with all the negative cliches attached to homosexuality.

So while the NYT probably didn't intend to attack gay people, the cartoon does evoke and exploit a history of homophobic mockery. It's a valid critique.
 
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