Political Cartoon: It Gets Worse
And what I want my cartoons to focus on in the coming year
Finally posting this cartoon published by
on Election Day morning that addressed Republican women considering voting blue. Pre-election cartoons warning about what Trump *would* do feel a lot worse to look at now that we know he'll soon be re-assuming the highest office in the land.I've been unusually strapped for time these last two months, but I think on top of that, I was avoiding publishing this cartoon. It's a vibe-killer.
Here's what I wrote to accompany this cartoon in Counterpoint when it was published:
"In the campaign’s final days, a key demographic has entered the political spotlight: women from Republican backgrounds, often with Republican husbands and communities, who expect—and often demand—they vote a certain way. Trump recently piled onto these women’s ever-growing list of reasons to fear for their own ability to freely make choices when he said that “whether the women like it or not,” he will “protect” them. In some cases, the GOP and its advocates have gone further by suggesting that their twisted partisan expectations for “righteous Christian living” and “how a Christian should vote” align with God’s. I hope these Republican women torn between ideologies stop to ask themselves what they really want, and whether those who claim to represent God have His interests in mind."
As I think about how I want to spend my time and effort on cartoons over the next four years, I want to avoid spending too much time on hitting home “X thing Trump et al. are doing is bad.” I don’t think our echo chamber needs more of that. More importantly, I don’t think pointing that stuff out is of much note to those who voted for him.
“X thing Trump et al. are doing is bad” seems to have been the focus of a lot of cartoons so far in the field as a whole. Given the evidence, I’m not sure it helps.
I want to lean into what has already been a focus for me—looking at what beliefs of the American people have put and kept this man and his allies in power.
I want to understand what got us here and make pleas to those on the right and in the middle to think hard about how they got there. I want to try every rhetorical strategy I can to get people in these groups to think hard about how they arrived at their perspectives.
Trump isn’t going to see my cartoons (although that would be really cool). I want to spend my time directly addressing the perspectives of the audience who might.
I also want to help folks on the left think about how best to reach folks on the right. Hopefully we can agree that there’s something about the mainstream left’s approach that’s not persuasive.
While writing this, especially given my recent NYC move, I was reminded of this SNL sketch from 2016, which I actually remember watching in a high school class.
I am not 100% sure which teacher showed us this in class. I have a hunch about which one but because I’m not sure and because the principal might not have liked that she did that, I will not guess.
Until next time.