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Sep
15
Central Connecticut State University Student Paper Prints Cartoon About Urinating and Holding Captive a 14 Year Old Latina
Filed Under Education and Academia, Gender and Sexism, Media Praises and Critiques, Original Essays and Analysis, Race and Racism, Sexuality and Heterosexism, Sociology, Uncategorized by Rachel
Update: Some students at CCSU have started their own blog–Take Back the Recorder– in opposition to the paper’s editorial staff.? Go show them your support.?
Last February we heard the story of a college newspaper in Connecticut that printed an article saying “rape is a magical experience” and “rape only hurts if you fight back.” The author claims he was trying to satirize rape, which he clearly did not achieve. 1 Well it looks like this bunch is at it again and more emboldened than ever since they managed to survive their last go round. This time, among other offensive diatribes, the Central Connecticut State University newspaper has published a cartoon about urinating on a 14 year old Latina, who is locked in a closet.2
I found out about this debacle from a comment left in the thread on the West Virginia rape and torture case over at Feministing. A commenter named prof/activist provided a link to the PDF copy of the paper. The offending cartoon can be found in it’s original context if you scroll to page 16, the final page of the PDF file. The cartoon consists of two figures one triangular and the other square. The triangle says that his urine smells like honey after he eats certain cereals, and the square asks if it tastes like urine. Then the triangle says, he doesn’t know he’ll have to ask the Latina girl tied up in the closet. Then, it jumps to the final frame where the square says, “Tell Juanita I said Hola.” The cartoon also has a sentence printed under it that says, “The Recorder Does Not Support the Kidnapping of (and Subsequent Urinating on) Children of Any Age.” I was going to repost the cartoon here, but it’s not worth the bandwidth. You can open the PDF file above to read it.
Students and faculty members, disgusted by the paper’s racist and sexist reputation, protested the cartoon on Friday. The story was covered in the local paper and it received national attention. Here’s a quote from the AP article in the New York Times:
The universitys president vowed on Friday to cut off advertising in the paper, and its critics have planned a protest on Monday on campus to push for reforms, including the ouster of the papers editor, Mark Rowan.
We believe the climate here at Central is one that fosters this kind of behavior, said Francisco Donis, a psychology professor and president of the universitys Latin American Association, so we want more systematic changes to create a welcoming environment for everyone to feel safe and secure.
About 5 percent of the 9,600 undergraduates are Hispanic, according to university figures. The campus is in New Britain, a racially diverse city of 71,000 about 12 miles southwest of Hartford.
Mr. Rowan, 21, was the editor in February, when the newspaper was criticized for publishing a satirical opinion piece titled Rape Only Hurts if You Fight It. The satire called sexual assault a magical experience that benefits ugly women.
The author of the article lost his position at the paper and apologized, but Mr. Rowan was allowed to retain his post.
The university created a task force that recommended providing more training for its student journalists, buying libel insurance and creating a student-run alternative paper or Web site.
Mr. Rowan, who is set to graduate in December, said lingering anger over that controversy was adding to outrage over the cartoon. He said he did not know if he would be asked to resign.
Rowan and his cronies have caused enough trouble for the University, ushering the school into the national spotlight on two separate occasions. It seems clear that Rowan lacks the ability to judge the quality and appropriateness of the paper’s content. Both pieces in question were not only offensive, but they also were of poor quality. Petroski’s rape article didn’t succeed at being satire, and this cartoon didn’t succeed at being funny. In fact, only a person like Ted Bundy would find either of these articles amusing, which makes me wonder if there are some sociopaths running this paper.
Mr. Rowan has shown poor judgment, and has allowed the student newspaper become a bottom feeder with little journalistic integrity. Right now Mr. Rowan holds two journalism related positions. He’s an editor of the CCSU student paper, and he has an internship with the Hartford Advocate, but at the rate he’s going he may never have another position in journalism. How is he going to explain these gaffes to potential employers? Who would want to hire someone, who routinely brings negative attention to their publication? He hasn’t learned his lesson, and that’s going to come back to haunt him in the future. A good editor thinks about getting the story, and getting quality material, not just pushing his political agenda and publishing anything that comes across the desk.
I know the retorts that the student editors will have–We have free speech. We didn’t mean to offend. Lighten up, it’s just a cartoon. You’re being too sensitive. I hear these arguments every time someone engages in offensive behavior like this. Rather than taking responsibility, they try to deflect the criticism by condemning the condemners. At this point, it’s pretty clear, that the University needs to step in and revamp the paper. If the student editors are unwilling to do this themselves, it is incumbent upon the University administration and the majority of students to oust the paper’s editors. This surely doesn’t represent the school, its administrators, and the vast majority of its students.
- If you want to see real rape satire, go here to Marcella’s site. [back]
- The writers and editors clearly haven’t learned their lesson. While scrolling through the electronic copy of the paper I found an article written by Justin Kloczko. The primary purpose of the article is to taunt a local reporter who is leaving the New Britain Herald to write for the Hartford Business Journal. The taunts and insults are directed at this reporter because he was one of the people who brought the February rape article to light. The article appears next to a picture that says “Crotch Shots, Nipple Slips, Cellulite Legs! The Recorder is not looking for the above, but is looking for dedicated photographers to cover local and campus events. Contact us at ccsurecorder@gmail.com and make us forget that Britney picture.” [back]
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11 Responses to “Central Connecticut State University Student Paper Prints Cartoon About Urinating and Holding Captive a 14 Year Old Latina”
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I was underwhelmed by the stupid WAY before I got to the moronic comic. Aside from the snideness of the music reviews (and apparant ignorance about both the presence of African-Americans in punk rock and rock – hint: we’re NOT a gimmick, we’re part of the fabric – and the fact that punk IS older than the average college student so it *gasp* may attract a older audience)… Um, there’s a comic about baleen whales debating whether to evolve as land creatures. [Whale-ancestors DID that, AFTER the time-set of the comic, and then returned to the ocean. So the college doesn't have a journalism major - does it have a decent BIOLOGY major?]
And onto the final comic (and I mean final in that it’s on the last page): My basic question is this: what’s supposed to be funny about abduction of anyone, especially a minor? Who’s the target of the humor? (because to my reading, it sure as hell isn’t the geometric characters) And if you WERE trying to be offensive, what would you have done differently?
[...] Rachel has more info. [...]
“Whole Wheat Bread was the only reason I decided to go see the show. They play stellar punk music and have a lot of fun doing it. Some people might see them as somewhat gimmicky due to the fact they are three black guys playing pop-punk, but they know what theyre doing and they do it better than 90 percent of the bands out there today.”
“Gimmicky” is Elvis Presley. Enema. The Rolling Stones.
You know, those people who commodified and appropriated black music (blues, rhythm and blues, lack gospel) and turned it into a former shadow of itself. Those people who took black people’s music and made more money off of black culture than the black performers who should have been credited for the music styles and contributions they created.
White performers are worshipped as gods of rock-n-roll and other music genres because they are white and are more acceptable than the black musicians, songwriters and bands who created so much music that the world loves.
Black musicians/songwriters have had a tremendous impact on the world of music, but, America’s giving credit to the white performers who made it rich by “whitening” down black music, as if they put the “soul” into soul music, does not surprise me.
America wants black culture and music, as long as she does not have to get TOO close to her black citizens. As long as white performers are given all the credit for music styles that were created by black people.
It’s okay for whites to get rich and famous off of black people’s music while many black performers die unknown and penniless.
God help us if those dreaded black people branch out into music forms like punk, AND do a damn good job at it.
It’s bad enough that black performers (Little Richard, Chuck Berry, etc.) are not given the true credit they are due, and all the glory is given to white performers who wouldn’t be where they are if not for the Little Richards and the Chuck Berrys of the world.
It’s even more bad when people like this reporter get pissed when black performers perform an aspect of music (punk), AND do a better job than most white performers of that music category.
As for the urinating cartoon:
R. Kelly Alert!
R. Kelly Alert!
Dangblasted typos!
“You know, those people who commodified and appropriated black music (blues, rhythm and blues, lack gospel)”
That was supposed to be “black gospel”.
And on a further note concerning the pissing on a 14-year-old girl:
It’s very obvious that the R. Kelly clones are in full force and are not going anywhere anytime soon.
I see this issue as much larger than just one loose cannon at a little college paper. We have understood for some time that a nut case sniper who assasinates a person such as Martin Luther King (for example) rises to the task because of his or her sense that their action is supported or even called for by the tacit (or not so tacit) agreement of a large enough segment of their societal population as to make the sniper feel that he or she is sort of “taking one for the team.”
I would argue that this young “journalist’s” decision-making is another example of this same concept. While I am disgusted by and maybe even horrified at this creep’s thinking, I’m not incredulous at it. I’m not even surprised. From what I can gather by the stats, most people in the U.S. claim to be anti-rape, anti-molestation, and pro-democracy. But repeated study stats demonstrate that rape and molestation are common to our culture as is the increasingly rabid nature of anti-Latin@ sentiment in this country. This jerk wearing an editor’s hat may have pushed the envelope, but he didn’t push it far beyond where it already was–and he knows it, regardless of how loud the protests get.
R. Kelly is still walking around free and making BIG money.
I went to CCSU for grad school, and in as far as I could tell, that asinine views shown in the paper were not indicative of the views of most students there. Granted, I’m sure some do find racist and sexist “humor” amusing, but most would not be as accepting of it as the a-hole cartoonist would like to believe.
Rachel, I teach a course at CCSU on the media and we spend most of tuesday talking about the incident. Most, if not all my students were upset, and some outraged by this cartoon. We talked about the cartoon for a while and our discussion led into a talk about the Jena 6 and the woman who was kidnapped, raped and beated in W. Virginia. We used the computer in the classroom to look up your blog and talk about some of these issues. Many, including myself, didn’t know of the “take back the recorder” blog, but thanks for the info.
I am surprised though that this happened at CCSU, despite the campus stats, the student body appears more racially diverse, and I think its more working-class than many schools too.
Steve: Have you asked your class to draw comparisons between the CCSU cartoon and that drawn recently by Lars Vilks of Sweden that portrays Mohammed’s head on the body of a dog? After all, political cartoons are rarely pretty.
trvolk, no I haven’t. Good idea though.
if this was a black person in the closet would it be allowed.it just shows that racisiam is showing it’s ugly head and for the school to condone this behavior ia appauling.
[...] Rachel added an interesting post today on Central Connecticut State University Student Paper Prints Cartoon …Here’s a small readingThe article appears next to a picture that says Crotch Shots, Nipple Slips, Cellulite Legs! The Recorder is not looking for the above, but is looking for dedicated photographers to cover local and campus events. … [...]