The android's dungeon

I can't help saying something about the controversy on Memin Penguin. Basically I believe that any accussation should be based on an informed basis. I am not familiar with the stories of Memin, I've seen him arround, but I have never read any of his comic books. However, from the comments of the people who know his comics seems to me that he's a good guy. Everyone says he's clever and lovable.

Seems to me that the people critisizing Memin are pre-judging him with prejudice. They call him the "worst kind of black stereotype" because he has "greatly exaggerated eyes and lips". Well, those people should start looking at other cartoon characters... of course some physical characteristics are exagerated in cartoons. That is why they are cartoons and not portraits!

Some mathematics (for "collectors"): there are 5 stamps @ 6.5 pesos each, that's 32 pesos for the whole set. (stamps via cartoon brew)

A recent bid on eBay sold the set for EUR 15.55 that's about $17.9 USD or $196 pesos. which means a net profit of 164 pesos. Very good for half an hour of standing in queue at the post office, and considering the fact that the stamps were issued last week! There are still some more auctions if you want to grab a piece of history. They say that there has been one set sold for $200USD...

There are many american cartoons that are not so PC (politically correct) by today's standards. There's Speedy Gonzalez, or Pepe lePew (who's banned from US TV for sexual harassment). And ... well, you know... the simpsons. Some of the characters, exagerate some stereotypes. But I don't see anyone complaining about that. (images courtesy of simpsonspark.com)

You must be able to laugh and make fun of yourself. That is a sign of self confidence. Look at this humor links site to get an idea of what I mean. The line between humour and mockery is not a fine one. It is very clear when someone speaks sarcastically, name calling, and other agressive expressions. That's no reason to ban all words from our languages. Some people abuse those words, and give them an offensive meaning, true. A semantic decoding (scan) of meaning can be done for pictures, cartoons, etc as they are also means of communication, to see which was the intentional message of the creator(s). So, it's quite simple to know when a stereotype was made with an offensive message. It is not a matter of superficial analysis, it needs a complete decoding (scan). Memin was labeled as racist, because the judges didn't scan the semantics of the character, they just prejudged with prejudice.

ciao