It’shard to be funny in a world of outrage
A Melbourne comedianrecently lamented how hard it was to crack a joke today given the rise in wokesensibilities. He might be right.
Mark Knight
October 8, 2024 - 8:32AM
Award-winning Herald Suncartoonist Mark Knight.
A Melbourne comedian saidto me “Geez it’s hard to crack a joke these days”, referring to the rise ofwoke sensibilities.
He might be right.
On May 21, I drew a cartoonfor the Herald Sun about the massive increase in immigration into Australia.
The political debate at thetime was whether our major cities, Sydney and Melbourne, could sustain a riseof 73 per cent, from 427,000 to 737,000 in 2022-23.
Melbourne was like an MCGtram after a Collingwood game, bursting at the seams and under intense pressureto house, and provide medical care, transport and services for anever-expanding population.
The Albanese governmentsaid it would “review” the numbers coming in (shuffle some paperwork) andOpposition Leader Peter Dutton, sensing a moment to go whack and land a punch,said he would substantially reduce immigration numbers.
I thought it would be agood topic to draw about for the next day’s paper as everybody was talkingabout it around the water coolers.
The Mark Knight cartoon forMay 21, 2024
With politics beingadversarial, my thoughts were to illustrate the differences on the issuebetween the two leaders.
I imagined Australia’sfront door as a large drawbridge that is lowered to let people in and thenraised when we needed to stem the flow.
Caricature and exaggerationare just some of tools of the cartoonist, so I drew the Prime Ministercomically making slow work of raising the drawbridge, sweating over a hugechain winch.
A large immigration intakewas keeping Australia just out of recession, so Albo didn’t want to close thatfront door too quickly! Mr Dutton, on the other hand, was trying to painthimself as the tough, strong leader and so he is caricatured shirtless with aBurt Reynolds-style hairy chest.
Dutton bellows “Standaside, Albo” in deep baritone, completing the send-up of the Opposition Leader.
At this point I thought Ihad painted their respective political positions pretty well, so I thought allI had to do then was add in a few arrivals coming in via the drawbridge.
But this is where I wentwrong, according to an unknown reader, who took great offence to my depictionof the immigrants in the cartoon and filed a complaint with the AustralianPress Council.
Australia is a colourful,multicultural land, so I drew a mix of folk entering Australia wearing theirvarious ethnic dresses in some cases, some in Western attire, carryingsuitcases, and all looking happy to be here.
It is not a stampede likethe opening of the front doors at Myer on Boxing Day, which might insinuatethat we are being overrun. They do not look angry or threatening.
The woman at the front isbeaming and an Indian chap is punching the air in exultation.
The people entering were notthe focus of the toon anyhow; it was our two political leaders and theirrespective positions.
The cartoon went to pressand the next day with no outrage or blowback it entered the world of fish andchip wrapping.
However, a month later theHerald Sun received an email from the Australian Press Council saying thatthere had been a complaint and the cartoon had breached General Principle 6 –that I had not taken reasonable care to avoid causing substantial distress,prejudice and risk to public health and safety.
It accused me of portrayingthe ethnic mix of immigrants to Australia with racial stereotypes such as biglips, hijabs, scarves, kufi, etc.
It said I had drawn PeterDutton as a “superhero” and as a result gave the impression that he was protectingAustralia from the danger posed by Muslim migrants.
And, finally, it said I hadnot drawn enough Chinese, Indian and Filipino people coming in.
The Herald Sun and I stoodbehind the cartoon, so it went to an APC adjudication panel where I would standbefore my unknown accuser and answer to a star chamber five-member panel over aphone hook-up.
A nice man named Mohammedwas chairing the cross-examination and I can only say that it was likesomething from an episode of Utopia.
I was asked about the sizeof noses and lips; we went over each nose forensically and I tried to show howwe all have our own ethnic facial characteristics.
I was asked why I didn’tjust draw blank balloon heads to avoid any racial stereotypes or offence. Itried to explain the art of political satire, caricature and the political term“hairy chested”.
Then there was freedom ofspeech.
I also mentioned socialmedia sites such as X (formerly Twitter), where you can openly see racialcommentary that will make your nose bleed, but that is too difficult for theAPC to patrol.
We, here in the accountablejournalism world, are low-hanging fruit for those prone to outrage.
The outcome handed downthis week was that the APC found I had contravened General Principle 6.
My punishment? Put instocks in Federation Square and have rotting vegetables thrown at me? Thesevering of the offending hand that drew said cartoon?
No, we must publish thecouncil’s findings, which we have done today.
And me? I have taken in thefindings, but will simply continue to cartoon this crazy world and do the jobI’m paid to do.
And give the perpetuallyoutraged something to be outraged about!
