Tremain - THAT cartoon

The thing that first puzzled then infuriated me was accusations of racism.

That's taking determination to be offended to insane levels. If the epidemic had been in Tasmania how would they have managed to obtain their "fix" of outrage - yet it would have been the same cartoon.

On facebook, many comments along the lines of  "How would you feel if it was your baby that died?"

Devastated, and guilty as hell at my own stupidity for not getting the poor little babe vaccinated ... but it's so much easier to shift the anger onto a cartoonist by screaming "Racist! Ban! Apologise!"

I was disappointed that the ODT's response to this was to double down on apologising for hurting people's feelings, without giving the causes of the epidemic a thorough examination. The need for governments and individuals to admit responsibility for suffering and death from preventable diseases should not be ignored. Intelligent mature examination, with the aim of informing so as to learn from the Samoan tragedies, is what the dead deserve as a tribute, not cowering at an onslaught of emotionalism and misplaced blame.

Easier to scream for vengeance against a cartoonist and a newspaper editor than against the anti-vaxxers who had disproportionate success spreading their lethal message in Samoa, compared with other Pacific Islands. They have done well in parts of NZ too:

The Northland town where parents refuse immunisation, despite kids dying

Nikki Macdonald09:58, Dec 07 2019

 ...In 2018, parents of about one in seven Hikurangi kids declined one or more jabs, or opted to remove their children from the immunisation register altogether....
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/117265334/the-northland-town-where-parents-refuse-immunisation-despite-kids-dying 

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Podcast: The Detail

Drawing a line of decency

The Detail today talks to two editorial cartoonists about the fine line they tread between satire and offensiveness 


On Twitter, Tremain’s Otago Daily Times piece was dubbed insensitive, offensive, and racist. ... Tremain himself was initially less apologetic.
“In this politically correct atmosphere that we’re now being bloody suffocated by, you have to be aware there’s a growing number of people who wake up every morning and their first intention is to find something to be offended about.”

“Being contentious – there’s no value in that. You want people to think and you want to stimulate some sort of debate,” says Rod Emmerson, the New Zealand Herald’s editorial cartoonist.
If he’s drawing a piece he suspects some will take umbrage to, he makes sure he knows why he’s pursuing that angle and is prepared to defend it, before it goes to print.
...
The editorial cartoonist for Stuff newspapers, Jeff Bell, disagrees with Tremain’s notion that political correctness is hampering cartoonists.
“I feel like the biggest problem there is is that Tremain’s possibly just gotten a little bit out of touch with how society has moved forward. I don’t think that’s about political correctness, I just think it was a bad cartoon.
“I don’t think at all that cartoonists are overly restrained by political correctness I just think there’s a lot more sensitivity on certain issues.”

 more:
https://www.newsroom.co.nz/@podcast-card/2019/12/12/944038/drawing-a-line-of-decency