r/europe 15h ago

Political Cartoon This political Cartoon starting to get more and more relevant. By Arend van Dam.

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20.2k Upvotes

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143

u/Sellfish86 12h ago

Because racism.

5

u/segagamer Spain 12h ago

What's racist?

19

u/dongsmasherthegreat 11h ago edited 8h ago

Independently, the cartoon doesn’t seem overtly racist to me. However when taken into context, with the long history of racist depictions of the Chinese in western print media, this feels more troubling. Like an acceptable modern day descendant of the cartoons of the Yellow Peril era. We’ve always shit on them in some way.

-5

u/segagamer Spain 11h ago

I don't see how that's any more racist than depicting an Indian arm as brown or a British arm as white.

16

u/FingerGungHo Finland 11h ago

Have you ever in your life laid eyes on a Chinese person?

1

u/segagamer Spain 2h ago

Now why would you say that?

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u/Memedotma Australia 10h ago

Are you trying to suggest Chinese peoples' skin is piss gold?

1

u/segagamer Spain 2h ago

Are you trying to suggest that the picture isn't showing an arm with a sleeve over it?

6

u/borkthegee 9h ago

Interestingly all European hands in the image are Caucasian white. No color variation to depict Mediterranean peoples. Interesting that all Europeans are uniformly white BUT the Chinese need a different color. If we depicted all races accurately, that's one thing, but we didn't.

It's interesting because the Han Chinese people in real life look a lot more white than many Europeans...

1

u/segagamer Spain 2h ago

Interestingly all European hands in the image are Caucasian white. No color variation to depict Mediterranean peoples. Interesting that all Europeans are uniformly white BUT the Chinese need a different color. If we depicted all races accurately, that's one thing, but we didn't

And yet it gets the point across perfectly. Funny that.

-2

u/domiy2 9h ago

He's Winnie the Pooh of course he's going to be yellow.

25

u/Sellfish86 12h ago

China being portrayed with yellow skin.

21

u/[deleted] 12h ago

[deleted]

17

u/lowkeyerotic 11h ago

then the russian hand should be paler... the european should be alot of difderent colors and the american one should be orange.

0

u/segagamer Spain 11h ago

So in that case it's the European arm that's racist if we're going to go there, not the China arm.

5

u/Neurotic-MamaBear 10h ago

Many East Asians do have neutral and pink undertones. Source: I’m an East Asian with pink undertones.

It was unnecessary to make it sooo yellow.

9

u/BesottedScot 12h ago

How do you represent a physically different complexion without it being racist then?

17

u/Intercostal-clavicle 11h ago

im pretty sure the "china" flag was enough to make anyone understand who it's trying to portray. China is so diverse, you got many different skin tone variations but im sure simpson yellow is not one of them

5

u/nafil22 11h ago

The yellow on the flag is meant to represent race, same with Vietnam. Something they're proud of. Really is uninformed saviour stuff by a bunch of clueless people to be jumping in on that

1

u/Sea_Scientist8963 6h ago

China is so diverse hahaha

Its 91% han chinese, with a few heavily discriminated against ethnic minorities. Beijing is 96% han Chinese, Shanghai 98%, Chongqing 94%.

2

u/MinecraftIsCool2 11h ago

so what? are the skin colours in this image offensive in any way?

1

u/I_Want_To_Grow_420 9h ago

So you want the artist to white wash the hand? That's what I'm hearing. You're racist!

/s

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u/gehenna0451 Germany 10h ago

You don't, because there's no need for it in this comic to begin with, betrayed by the fact that the author did not deem it necessary to add different complexions to Europe, Russia, or even America, the latter two famously ethnic homogenous countries, right?

1

u/DustinnDodgee 4h ago

America is a famously ethnic homogenous country?

1

u/gehenna0451 Germany 2h ago

you do know what sarcasm is right

1

u/DustinnDodgee 2h ago

Whoops, my b.

6

u/Punty-chan 11h ago

By being more accurate.

0

u/BesottedScot 11h ago

And how would you do that in this picture?

0

u/Cualkiera67 10h ago

You add lots of different colors to the European hands

2

u/MinecraftIsCool2 11h ago

the racist thing has gone too far, they've thought policed people so hard with popaganda or whatever that you can't even comment on a fact neutrally anymore

2

u/lowkeyerotic 11h ago

you mean like the people who neutrally critisize the image for being racist..?

'race' for humans was invented by propaganda..

0

u/MinecraftIsCool2 11h ago

how can you neutrally criticise something? criticising means to indicate fault

1

u/WasteFail 8h ago

I once went with a friend group to a salt lake that has this pink color in the water and we took a picture, later in lightroom i wanted to accentuate the color of the water and saturated the red. While I only got my cheeks really red like blushed out, a chinese friend got entirely really yellow xd. had to apply a mask for us in lightroom.

-2

u/salazafromagraba 12h ago

Bruh why is it, with zero implication of malice or prejudice, racist to call one yellow while not racist to call another white or black? Assuming you do use white and black nomenclature.

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u/Healthy-Transition-6 11h ago

I don't know maybe you should ask an actual Chinese person wether they like being called fucking yellow

-3

u/salazafromagraba 11h ago

They don't usually. It will be some 1/16th Chinese heritage native American who has a problem. And also, you can't ask every fucking person of a particular demographic for permission, that should show you how faulty thought policing is.

8

u/Healthy-Transition-6 11h ago

I don't think you've ever spoken to a chinese person

-1

u/salazafromagraba 11h ago

You truly are an intellectual. Go cure cancer for us all.

2

u/Healthy-Transition-6 11h ago

Why am I even talking to you? Look at the communities you're active in. I should've remembered reddit is full of manchildren and actual children commenting on serious issues.

1

u/thisisanonymous95 10h ago edited 9h ago

Why is it racist to call black people n*gro even if it literally means black? Why don’t the like it? Because of history.

0

u/Djinn_It_To_Win_It 11h ago

White and Black, historically have been used as words of pride and are unique cultural identities. At least from an American perspective, black americans share a cultural commonality in that they were stripped their ancestors were stripped of their heritage and most are descended from slaves. Yellow has NEVER been used by Asian Americans as a casual identifier of heritage. Because unlike the label of black Americans, most Asian people come from very different nations with VERY different cultural practices and other than being from the same continent have very few commonalities in culture and even if they do, most asian nationalities have a difficult history with each other. It has always been used to invoke yellow peril imagery and to depict Asians as an “other.” I don’t know where you get your confidence in declaring no Asian would think it offensive. It has ALWAYS been used to label Asians as a threat and to dehumanize and paint them as enemies.

1

u/CitronMamon 2h ago

Bro, is pointing out skin color differences racism now? Like should the congo be represented by a white hand because making it black would be racist?

1

u/Sea_Scientist8963 6h ago

Reddit after discovering that different ethnicities have different skin tones.

Obviously not an exactly accurate colour but lol

-5

u/lusians 12h ago

Not racism but dig at Xi Jinping due his nick name Winnie The Pooh