Posted on 11/28/2017 4:53:04 AM PST by ConservativeStatement
Dr. Seuss’ colorful characters and rhyming whimsy have made the late writer’s books a staple in libraries both personal and public.
But Seuss was not without his shortcomings, says Philip Nel, an English professor at Kansas State University. According to Nel, Seuss’ “The Cat in the Hat” is rife with racial caricature and “the influence of blackface minstrelsy lingers.”
(Excerpt) Read more at chicagotribune.com ...
Historical Analysis
“What few Americans know is that, despite his popular image as a kindly cartoonist for kids, Dr. Seuss was also a moralist and political progressive whose views suffuse his stories.”
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/14765-radical-reading-the-progressive-dr-seuss
Years ago, I was engaged in a conversation with a white male liberal. He was a proponent of affirmative action, was very much in favor of white males being pushed to the back of the line. He was well-off financially, established, etc.
When I asked why he didn’t leave his position and be replaced by someone he claimed to be a victim, his answer was “I can help more in a position of power.” And that is liberalism. Do what I say not as I do.
Imagine this professor teaching Dr. Seuss in some other venue rather than a sheltered college classroom? Reminds me of the Clash song “Safe European Home.”
He needs a new job as the poster boy for low testosterone.
The Butter Battle Book
The Butter Battle Book, written in 1984, was a clear political statement about the danger and implications of the Cold War.
The book depicts a war between two parties. The Yooks, dressed in blue, are a clear depiction of the Americans, while the Zooks, dressed in red, resemble the Soviet army.
The book’s premise is about the war that is fuelled by the different viewpoints of how one should butter their bread.
The Yooks and Zooks constantly try to build better weaponry to scare the enemy, which is a clear correlation to the arms race.
The book’s message is that the arms race could be avoided if the trivial misunderstanding of “which side of bread is to be buttered,” could just be let go, which would lead to each side not needing to increase the power of its arsenal.[20]”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_messages_of_Dr._Seuss
That’s violence against cats!
Help me! I’m so triggered!
A child’s first seriously anti-racist book is typically Seuss’ “The Sneetches”.
For the author to ignore that literary beacon while fixating on minutiae elsewhere is malicious.
Self-hating white boy. And jeez, even Tucker knows the bow tie is gayer than a ride on a Navy ferry.
Dr. Seuss’s political leanings are well known—he was a liberal Democrat who opposed fascism in the 1940s and President Nixon in the 1970s. The new movie of his book The Lorax is a fairly unsubtle pro-environment allegory.
Less well celebrated are Theodor Seuss Geisel’s early advertising and political cartoons from the 1920s through the 1940s, which feature a decidely racist streak. ...”
In the ads (from the collection of the library of the University of California, San Diego), black people are presented as savages, living in the tropics, dressed in grass skirts. Arabs are portrayed as camel-riding nomads or sultans. In his political cartoons (from the collection of the Springfield Library and Museums Association), Seuss inveighed against the Japanese during World War II; he drew them buck-toothed and squint-eyed. ..."
http://www.businessinsider.com/before-dr-seuss-was-famous-he-drew-these-sad-racist-ads-2012-3
How big of a fight will be started when the Bernstein Bears are attacked like this?
Racist looks for racism; finds it
When you put a dab of mint under your nose before going into surgery or an autopsy everything smells like mint. The bathroom, your lunch, the stench of the dead...all smells like mint.
Similarly, when a person puts on racist goggles they see everything through the lens of race...all looks racist.
Ping to posts 24, 28, and 32...
http://freerepublic.com/focus/news/3608512/posts?page=24#24
http://freerepublic.com/focus/news/3608512/posts?page=28#28
http://freerepublic.com/focus/news/3608512/posts?page=32#32
The cat in the hat is racist? Who knew a character in a children’s book was...
I read somewhere that at least half of all academic papers are read only by the journal editor and peer reviewer. And that half of all academic books have fewer than 10 readers.
They demonized the Tom Swift series of books for kids as being r@cist
Dr. Seuss author, Theodore Geisel, was a big time lefty. And he did draw racist cartoons, at least in his early days. That is, before he realized he needed to ‘clean it up’ if he was going to continue pushing the liberal-lefty agenda to children via his cartoons and so forth.
See my posts 28 and 32.
“Less well celebrated are Theodor Seuss Geisel’s early advertising and political cartoons from the 1920s through the 1940s,”
Operative word: EARLY.
Later works with orders-of-magnitude greater impact atone for earlier less-known cultural-norm content.
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