CAN RACISM BE IN THE EYE OF THE BEHOLDER...?

Copyright KELLOGG'S

Take a look at the above pic from a 2017 box of a cereal called CORN POPS.  Now take a look (below) at the tweet from someone called SALADIN AHMED, a comicbook, sci-fi and fantasy writer.  Note that none of these cartoon characters are white, and then ask yourself if Saladin has a point.  Consider first though, that the 'brown corn pop' is engaged in legitimate employment for which (in the real world) he would be paid.

Can depicting someone involved in honest employment and conscientiously going about their business be seriously interpreted as racism?  Last time I looked, white guys are also janitors so there's surely nothing intrinsically demeaning about the position.  Since when did someone doing their job ever qualify as racism?  Ah, but it's a menial position someone cries.  Really?  I'll think you'll find that people of all colours sometimes fill menial positions. 

If you ask me (not that you did), Saladin has too much time on his hands and is determined to take offence at the most inconsequential trivialities.  I doubt that any kids seeing this picture would learn racism from it.  It's entirely possible that the brown pop was included for PC reasons of 'diversity', and the fact that he's shown as the only one not 'goofing off' was meant as a positive depiction.  Though we could also ask whether he's even meant to be the pop equivalent of a brown person.

However, cereal makers KELLOGG'S folded immediately when 'confronted' with Saladin's absurd (in my opinion) assertion, and amended future packaging.  Had it been me in charge, I'd simply have said that there was no racist suggestion intended in showing a hard-working employee going about his business, and that to read such a thing into the illustration was taking things to extreme.

What's your view, Criv-ites?  Racism, or simply yet another case of much ado about nothing?         

Posted in: Cartoons