The content on this webpage contains paid/affiliate links. When you click on any of our affiliate link, we/I may get a small compensation at no cost to you. See our affiliate disclosure for more info -----------------------
Last updated on March 6th, 2018 at 12:30 am
Current political disputes aren’t the first caused by cartoons. In this 2002 speech, Australian treasurer Peter Costello tells the story of New Zealand-born cartoonist David Low, a troublemaker in Britain during the 1930s:
Low’s regular depictions of the Fuhrer caused enormous diplomatic problems for the British Government, but they were to prove remarkably prophetic. Throughout the decade he portrayed the German dictator as a ludicrous, vain, pompous fool with unbridled ambition.
In 1933 the Nazis banned the Evening Standard and all newspapers carrying Low’s work because of a cartoon he had drawn depicting Germany’s withdrawal from the League of Nations.
In 1936 during the Berlin Olympic Games Low received his first request to tone down his depiction of Hitler in the interests of “good relations between all countries”.
In 1937 the British Foreign Secretary Lord Halifax visited Germany and met with the Propaganda Minister Goebbels, who told him that Hitler was very sensitive to criticism in the British press, and he singled out Low for attention.
Lord Halifax contacted the manager of the Evening Standard to see if Low could be toned down. He said:
“You cannot imagine the frenzy that these cartoons cause. As soon as a copy of the Evening Standard arrives, it is pounced on for Low’s cartoon, and if it is of Hitler, as it generally is, telephones buzz, tempers rise, fevers mount, and the whole governmental system of Germany is in uproar. It has hardly subsided before the next one arrives. We in England can’t understand the violence of the reaction.”
It wasn’t only Hitler complaining about Low. In 1938 Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain singled out Low while appealing to newspapers to temper their critical commentary of Germany. Chamberlain said:
“Such criticism might do a great deal to embitter relations when we on our side are trying to improve them. German Nazis have been particularly annoyed by criticisms in the British press, and especially by cartoons. The bitter cartoons of Low of the Evening Standard have been a frequent source of complaint.”
Weird to think, from our remove, that anyone would ever have taken complaints from Nazis seriously.
- A google image search found this easily enough.Posted by Good Face on 2006 02 22 at 10:36 PM • permalink
- Oh, Jesus, Tim, that’s brilliant.
You just made my frickin’ year.
Posted by NewSisyphus on 2006 02 22 at 10:39 PM • permalink
- Who do you think you are kidding Mr. Hitler?
If you think we’re on the run,
We are the boys who will stop your little game.
We are the boys who will make you think again.
‘Cus who do you think you are kidding Mr. Hitler?
If you think old England’s done?Could replace Hitler with Mr Hammas or Mr O’sama or Mr Mo or Mr Allah or Mrs Allah Mr Irving.
- Low drew my three favorite cartoons from the WWII era. In one Hitler and Stalin are bowing to each other, grinning, and saluting each other by lifting their caps, all while standing over the corpse of Poland. “The scum of the Earth, I believe,” Hitler says. “The bloody-handed assassin of the workers, I presume,” says Stalin.
In one from the end of the war, when the voters turned out Churchill’s government for a Labor Party government, he shows a disgruntled, sullen Churchill the party leader standing in front of a gigantic plinth. Sitting on top of it is another Churchill, smoking a cigar. The plinth is labeled “leader of Humanity”. “Cheer up,” the smoker tells the other Churchill. “They’ll forget you soon enough, but they’ll remember me forever.”
The third, and most moving one for me, is from just after the fall of France in 1940. It shows a small island, its coast battered by storm waves. A British soldier stands on the island, armed only with a rifle. He looks up and shakes his fist at a dark, stormy, lowering sky filled with numerous Nazi bombers. The caption reads “Very well, alone.”
Posted by Michael Lonie on 2006 02 22 at 11:03 PM • permalink
Weird to think, from our remove, that anyone would ever have taken complaints from Nazis seriously.
Well, if you’re Jewish, you can more than imagine it.
And let’s say you’re Jewish and Canadian.
There were plenty of people that had no problem with the Nazis, like, for example, Canadian Prime Minister William Mackenzie King.
First, the good news:
With over 21 years in the office, he had the longest combined time in the Prime Minister position in British Commonwealth history. King is considered by many historians to be among the greatest of Canada’s Prime Ministers.
Of course he is.
Then the bad news:
King hoped an outbreak of war in the 1930s could be avoided, and he supported the appeasement policy of the British. He had met with Hermann Göring and Adolf Hitler, whom he said was a reasonable man who cared for his fellow man, working to improve his country in the midst of the Depression. He confided in his diary that he thought Hitler “might come to be thought of as one of the saviours of the world” and told a Jewish delegation that “Kristallnacht might turn out to be a blessing.”
This kind of ignorance took a blunt tone in action in that the King government, especially through the civil servant, Charles Frederick Blair, refused to allow significant Jewish immigration regardless of how the situation for the Jewish population in Europe deterioriated into the Holocaust. It was an attitude epitomized by a comment, by one civil servant, when asked how many Jews were allowed to immigrate immediately after World War II, he replied “None is too many.” That became the title of a famous history book which was instrumental in revealing Canada’s anti-Semitic immigration policy in that period. The ocean liner St. Louis was carrying 907 Jewish people seeking shelter from the happenings of the war in Europe. Of the 907 people on the ship, none entered Canada. Forty-four well-known Canadians, including professors, editors, and industrialists urged King to offer them sanctuary, but King would not hear of it.
Hitler, a reasonable and caring man. One of the savio(u)rs, even.
Lovely.
Posted by SoCalJustice on 2006 02 22 at 11:10 PM • permalink
- “Such criticism might do a great deal to embitter relations when we on our side are trying to improve them “
If it was wrong to appease the Great Dictator then its probably wrong to appease the Islamofascists now.
Personally, I don’t care if we embitter relations as it just weakens our resolve.
Posted by Go Canucks on 2006 02 22 at 11:12 PM • permalink
- Thank goodness we have cartoonists and editors in Australia who are fearlessly willing to stand up for these values, like um… that Courier Mail subeditor who was trying to fill a space and, um…Posted by Margos Maid on 2006 02 22 at 11:22 PM • permalink
- Let’s go shopping, I’ve just placed an order for this T.
“Such criticism might do a great deal to embitter relations when we on our side are trying to improve them. German Nazis have been particularly annoyed by criticisms in the British press, and especially by cartoons. The bitter cartoons of Low of the Evening Standard have been a frequent source of complaint.”
Clearly, idiots are born unto every generation. So much for Darwinism.
Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2006 02 22 at 11:41 PM • permalink
- “As soon as a copy of the Evening Standard arrives, it is pounced on for Low’s cartoon, and if it is of Hitler, as it generally is, telephones buzz, tempers rise, fevers mount, and the whole governmental system of Germany is in uproar. It has hardly subsided before the next one arrives. We in England can’t understand the violence of the reaction.”
Telephones buzzing, tempers rising, and fevers mounting…from the Nazis!
Flags burning, embassies burning, people dying…from the ROPers!
Draw your own conclusions.
- The_Real_JeffS
Yup, but the idiots wont fight. They leave that to the “nasty” men who join the army and stuff.
Therefore they futher polute the gene pool as they are less likely to be shot, and more likely to breed.Posted by thefrollickingmole on 2006 02 23 at 12:01 AM • permalink
- Is it just me, or should we be teaching more Machiavelli to our students these days?
If he yields it from fear, it is for the purpose of avoiding war, and he will rarely escape from that; for he to whom he has from cowardice conceded the one thing will not be satisfied, but will want to take other things from him, and his arrogance will increase as his esteem for the prince is lessened. – Niccoló Machiavelli, The Discourses. 1517.
One ought never to allow a disorder to take place in order to avoid war, for war is not thereby avoided, but only deferred to your disadvantage. – Niccoló Machiavelli, The Prince. 1537.
Posted by Mr Snuffalupagus on 2006 02 23 at 12:12 AM • permalink
- Teodore Geissel (a/k/a Dr. Seuss) also did political cartooning through the war. I’ve got a collection of them somewhere.
Every time I look at it, there’s a part of my brain that keeps expecting his Hitler to whip out a plate of Green Eggs and Ham.
Posted by John Nowak on 2006 02 23 at 12:15 AM • permalink
- “Wierd to think, from our remove, that anyone would ever have taken complaints for Nazis seriously.”
Well not bloody really. Not from a man who was willing to participate in a process that was willing to cede whole chunks of free peoples to that same Nazi tyranny for “Peace in our time.” What matters free speech and some cartoonist, I’m thinking.
- I think it’s bloody ridiculous that the bloody Prime Minister of Australia has to bloody well defend the new bloody tourist ad and how we are being marketed as politically correct Australians.
Mr Howard said he did not believe the ads implied that Australians had bad manners.
Which politically correct group challenged this perspective. Bloody Hell! Which Journalist?
- A plethora of Low’s cartoons can be seen at:
http://images.google.com/images?q=david+low&hl=en&btnG=Search+ImagesPosted by Mystery Meat on 2006 02 23 at 01:30 AM • permalink
- 1943. MGM animator Tex Avery has just finished his classic cartoon, Blitz Wolf, when he gets called into the office of an MGM executive, who tells him, “You might want to take it easier on Hitler, Tex. He could still win the war.”Posted by richard mcenroe on 2006 02 23 at 01:35 AM • permalink
- This is the proper course of action to take when considering comedy that may be offensive to someone, somewhere in the world:
nullIf only the Evening Standard had submitted Low’s work to Goebbels for approval, how much better would relations between Hitler and Britain have been.
- Whoops, couldn’t get Link to work….
Here’s a cut and paste link:
http://www.crikey.com.au/articles/2006/02/20-1536-1308.html
The new Australian Censorship Board – Fatwa’s on request.
- Here’s the fatwa approving the Muslim High Five Comedy skit, originally pulled by Channel 10 and then run once the Mufti had issued his Fatwa:
I’ll bet they never took his advice about submitting it to a Christian authority as well!
Also, Nick Murray, CEO and chief appeaser, and the folks at Jigsaw -email thefolks@jigsaw.tv – are not accepting emails.
The question is, should Channel 10 now submit all content for an approval fatwa before going to air, just in case something offends some Muslim somewhere?
- Agaiin Link didn’t work.
Here is the Fatwa .pdf link:
http://www.crikey.com.au/sealed/images/2006/02/20-1162J0X9G00.pdf
- A quote in the Australian newspaper (cut and paste article) we should not tolerate the intolerant I think this was said by the editor of Jyllands Posten. I did not have any real issues with Islam until they put a Fatwa on Rushdie’s Satanic Verses. Then I thought who the hell do these people think they are, Western societies have bent over backwards to accommodate Muslims. But for what in return gratitude not likely, they must think we are a weak bunch idiots. The old bumper sticker KEEP HONKING I”M JUST RELOADING springs to mind. They will keep pushing until we cannot take it anymore and like the cowards that they are they will run away in their underpants leaving their boots behind (Egyptians and Iraqi army) and the green flags of Islam will become white in the blink of an eye. CHEERS!
- Low was NOT a good guy. As well as ridiculing the Nazis, he constantly ridiculed British re-armament and military presparations to resist Hitler (He created Colonel Blimp, always depicted as spouting self-evidently ludicrous things like: “Gad, Sir! Winston is right!”) He was as inconsistant and incapable of joined-up thinking as any modern leftist.Posted by Susan Norton on 2006 02 23 at 03:40 AM • permalink
- Sounds like what Hollywood needs to do, in this the US’s hour of need, is to prop up flagging morale and fading hopes with a rousing tale of courage against impossible odds and determination in the face of insuperable difficulties!!!!!
Has anyone thought of making a 3 hour masterpiece (ala The Longest Day) about Sean Penn’s heroism paddling that little boat around the Streets of New Orleans???
Hmmmm, and maybe for the sake of portraying a stirring example of raw grit and determination, disregard the fact the idiot forgot to stop up the bunghole of the thing first??? :o)
- Dunno, this may be old news, but I can’t help reflecting on the difference in attitudes to denigrating Christianity and denigrating Islam:
Virgin Mary Cartoon Stirs Debate Over Freedom to Offend
Note the difference in the reaction of those insulted too. In particular, notice the words “boycott” and “protest website” as opposed to “riot” and “destruction”.
Posted by Mr Snuffalupagus on 2006 02 23 at 03:53 AM • permalink
- I remember seeing 1930 UK peace shorts (made for cinema intervals, shown on TV in the 70s) – the kind-hearted naivety was sickening: Stout yeoman leaning on a spade, “If my neighbour demands my shovel, why shouldn’t I give it to him? Why fight over a shovel?”, or sentiments to that effect. What the 1930 appeasers and the current day ones overlook is that our neightbours – Muslims – are not only going to demand our shovels, once they’ve got them they’ll kill us anyway. They’ve made that quite clear.
And, in the UK, there were many well-connected and prominent people who were prepared to do a deal with Hitler when he conquered Britain – Unity Mitford and Edward VIII for starters.
Wikipedia has a good article (which appears balanced) on appeasement.
Posted by walterplinge on 2006 02 23 at 03:54 AM • permalink
- O/T – David Williamson, being a glutton for punishment and not having learned his lesson over his whinge about the free cruise, gets stuck into fellow Australians yet again, in today’s The Australia. Guess what?—we’re all dumb bogans, just because we don’t like his stupid plays and won’t worship at his feet.
McMansion Man, it seems, has eschewed all beliefs and ideas of human betterment and just gets on with working hard and being an “ordinary” Australian. He understands deep in his soul that only material acquisition brings human happiness and he goes for it flat out without worrying about all that rubbish about global warming and looming energy crises. And he votes for the man who delivered all this to him, John Howard.
Take a deep breath and plunge into the miasma here.
Someone should tell this ghastly pseud that ‘human betterment’ is the sum of individual’s betterment. I wish someone would take his ‘human betterment’ and ram it up his backside. OK, I’m guilty – I don’t give two hoots about human betterment. Family betterment my aim. My taxes are for human betterment (more’s the pity).
Posted by walterplinge on 2006 02 23 at 04:04 AM • permalink
- O/T I see Costello today has said:
ANYONE who believes Islamic sharia law can co-exist with Australian law should move to a country where they feel more comfortable.
All Australian citizens must adhere to the framework in society which maintains tolerance and protects the rights and liberties of all, he said. It is a pre-condition for citizenship of Australia.
Pity it isn’t a pre-condition for being allowed to immigrate here in the first place, let alone deciding if u want to take up citizenship…. bit late once there all in here and they don’t quite feel the need to sod off anytime soon….
- #41 walterplinge:
LMAO at “Take a deep breath and plunge into the miasma here.” 😀
#42 casanova:
“Pity it isn’t a pre-condition for being allowed to immigrate here in the first place…” Good call! Couldn’t agree more.
Posted by Mr Snuffalupagus on 2006 02 23 at 04:11 AM • permalink
- #42 casanova
Yeah, he said much the same thing a few months ago. All very nicely put.
“This is the product known as Australia. Have a look – feel the quality. But if its going to clash with what you have already, please feel free to shop elsewhere.”
Good chap Mr Costello. Just needs to keep being patient though and he’ll be given the keys to the Lodge.
Posted by Stop Continental Drift! on 2006 02 23 at 04:28 AM • permalink
- Yep, what Costello said does sound good, its just that once they’re in here, how many of them do u ever hear of leaving, unless they’re doing a runner from the law…
when they opt to come here, along with whatever other visa restrictions they sign up to abide by, it should be quite explicitly explained to them that you come here and start causing trouble or formenting or inciting discontent, and your arse won’t touch the ground on the way out back to wherever u came from…. whether u like it or not…
if they had to sign something, a condition of entry and this was made quite clear to them and the consequences involved, then they could be held to be in breach of it, and we could quite legitimately eject them….
- Inurbanus
PW would dispute that there is anything inherently genetically related about the germans that either causes them to easily over react, fail to grasp the subtler aspects of humour, or be susceptible to raving nutcases…. :o)
perhaps it was just a cultural thing of some of the more refined gentleman of the upper crust of Old Blightey????
- casanova
I was thinking of present day appeasers and ‘spineless leaders of democracy’ in the UK. Is their a gene for invertebracy?
#41 walterplinge, thanks for the link
David Williamson – “Artists and public intellectuals have been attacked with a shrillness that has no precedent in our history.”
(1) good to know they’re feeling a little besieged. Debate in this country may be getting as healthy as what we see in the States.
(2) Karl Popper was an intellectual. Robert Manne is …?
(3) If you confuse your day job with left polemic, then you are an artist or intellectual.
- Other vile and unforgivable behavour by Low was his cartoon circa 1944 attacking the Poles for protesting about Katyn.Posted by Susan Norton on 2006 02 23 at 05:57 AM • permalink
- Stanley Baldwin: “The difference between a man of intellect and an intellectual is the difference between a gentleman and a gent.”
WH Auden:
“To the man in the street, who, I’m sorry to say, is a keen observer of life,
The word ‘intellectual’ suggests straight away a man who’s untrue to his wife.”Posted by Susan Norton on 2006 02 23 at 08:32 AM • permalink
- “We in England can’t understand the violence of the reaction.”
Genetic?
Do you mean the violent reaction or the lack of understanding it? 😛
PW would dispute that there is anything inherently genetically related about the germans that either causes them to easily over react, fail to grasp the subtler aspects of humour, or be susceptible to raving nutcases…. :o)
I’ve never actually disputed the notion (I know better than to believe the lefty creed that everybody is born exactly the same and all differences must be cultural, so certainly even outlandish possibilities are at least, well, possible, when it comes to genetics), I’ve just said that it’s unhelpful to keep asserting it unless you’re going for a self-fulfilling prophecy. 😉
- 22 LukeF
We already know we have free(ish) speech.
Oh do we? Did you read that in the Boston Phoenix?
Let’s have cartoons of Mohammed or rabid imams or whoever, but make them worth publishing.
These cartoons have justified their existence a thousand times over already.
37 Susan Norton
Low was NOT a good guy.
Maybe not, but he did good work.
Posted by Stoop Davy Dave on 2006 02 23 at 11:34 AM • permalink
- The power of ridicule, even by the cartoonist, should not be underestimated. Thomas Nast comes to mind, with his caricatures of Tammany Hall political honcho, “Boss” Tweed. The cartoons were widely credited with helping to generate the public outcry against Tweed that eventually led to his conviction and imprisonment. In fact, Tweed reportedly feared Nast’s cartoons more than any other threat to his power.
That’s one reason why I think the Mo Toons are so significant; they are flushing out, into the open, not only some of the unpleasant aspects of Islam that the MSM can no longer ignore (unless their stampede to irrelevance is now definitely irreversible), but also the contorted hypocrisies and mere quaking fear of politicians, academics and our other “betters”, who now stand before, rather than in, judgement by the body politic.
- 37
As well as ridiculing the Nazis, he constantly ridiculed British re-armament and military presparations to resist Hitler (He created Colonel Blimp, always depicted as spouting self-evidently ludicrous things like: “Gad, Sir! Winston is right!”)
It’s not unthinkable that many of these efforts and preparations were sometimes done in cocked-up ways and/or undertaken by ludicrous persons. War is hell, that way. And it’s also a grim truth of the cartoonist’s profession that deadlines keep arriving whether or not anything funny has happened in any given day. Like I say, he was a cartoonist, and a product of his time and place. The most important thing happening IN that time and place was Hitler, so if he got Hitler cartooned up right, I’m content with that.
Posted by Stoop Davy Dave on 2006 02 23 at 11:51 AM • permalink
- “The USA also had its share of Hitler sympathisers. The Kennedy family were pre-eminent in that regard until they realised there was more money to be made out of equipping others to fight him.”
Yes, Joe Kennedy Sr. was the American Ambassador to Britain before the war, and he did have Nazi sympathies and publicly stated Britain could not win the war. But– his son, Joe Jr., enlisted in the Air Force and was killed in action. His younger son, John F. Kennedy, enlisted in the Navy, and acquitted himself honorably. Both these men could have gotten out of military service through their father’s political connections, but they chose to serve.
So, while the present-day hier to the Kennedy legacy, Teddy Kennedy, is beneath contempt, he does not reflect the family as a whole.
Posted by Mystery Meat on 2006 02 23 at 12:28 PM • permalink
- Here are a few Dr. Seuss cartoons on WWII. Many of them are still relevant today.
Making fun of Hitler:
http://orpheus.ucsd.edu/speccoll/dspolitic/pm/1942/20515cs.jpg
Replace the men with sticks with Danes with Cartoon of Mohammed.Strange Bedfellows – America First and the Nazis
http://orpheus.ucsd.edu/speccoll/dspolitic/pm/10708cs.jpg
Today many view the strange alliance of radical Muslims and the radical left.Many of his cartoons can be found here:
http://orpheus.ucsd.edu/speccoll/dspolitic/
Page 1 of 1 pages
