Political Cartoon Exemplar
Title: “Baseball”
Artist: Walt Handelsman
Date of Publication: September 24, 2006
Link: http://www.newsday.com/news/opinion/ny-walt-april,0,2984870.gallery?coll=ny-editorial-cartoo
What issue, event or idea does the cartoon address?
This cartoon addresses the issue of conflicts and violence between rival groups. While the woman in the cartoon clearly is referring to tensions between ethnic or religious groups in several hot spots in the Middle East, the man is referring to a very different sort of rivalry between baseball fans.
What key people or groups are part of the cartoon’s message?
Part of this cartoon’s effectiveness lies in its use of ordinary-looking people to make the point that anyone could be thinking about these issues.
Choose one technique (symbolism, exaggeration, labeling, humor/irony, or stereotype) and briefly explain how the artist used it in the cartoon.
The cartoonist very effectively uses labeling to drive home the point that each person is making in the cartoon. Since the two individuals are having a conversation without looking at one another’s newspaper sections, the labels help us to see that while each one is talking about regional conflicts and warring factions, they clearly are focused on two very different areas. The labels on the woman’s newspaper indicate that she is concerned about conflict in several Middle Eastern countries, while the labels on the man’s newspaper help us to see that he’s talking about the cross-town baseball rivalry between the Mets and Yankees in a potential playoff series.
What is the message of the cartoon? What do you think is the cartoonist’s opinion or point of view on this issue?
I think the cartoonist is trying to make the point that Americans should be paying attention to events in the Middle East. Instead, many seem to push aside these weighty issues and focus on issues that may be more fun or interesting to them like sports.
I think that this cartoon shows how some people in the United States ignores and forgets about what happens in the middle east and instead focuses on the events in our country. This cartoon also shows that we fail to keep our attention on the war in Iraq in which we got ourselves into but fail to recognize our progress and events that have and continue to turn some of the people in the middle east against us. This cartoon should force americans into realizing how much importance the middle east is due to our unleaveable presence.