The Elephant in the Room

[sirs]

LOL....it's referred to as the Gorilla in the room.  If one wanted to actually make it racist, it would have been a small monkey, or even chimp perhaps. "Gorilla in the room" is often used, just like "elephant in the room".  Nothing racist about it, unless of course, one is LOOKING to make it racist

Are you actually pulling a JJ??

[BT]

Well that certainly goes with the title of the thread.

Who is JJ

[sirs]

Racebaiter deluxe, Jessie Jackson

[BT]

1.    ape    321 up, 164 down
   
*Another term for a gorilla.

*A racist slur toward a black person (because of the physical similarities between black people and monkeys).


http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=ape

[sirs]

as I said, if it were racist, it'd been more of a moneky, vs how it was used to demonstrate the gorilla in the room, in the cartoon's case, in the courtroom

[BT]

So a gorilla is not racist but a chimp is. Who knew.

If you find the time could you verify that thesis next time you are in Compton.

[Plane]

But of course.  It dares to criticize Obamination care, and higlight the real elephant/gorilla in the room       

It's racist because the author chose to portray obama (and his signature piece of legislation) as a gorilla.

In your opinion....

What is a better choice of animal?


I favor the albatross,or if it wouldn't be sexist , the blue footed boobey.

[BT]

albatross works

[Xavier_Onassis]

The expression is "elephant in the room". The gorilla bit comes from some recent insurance commercial.
"Elephant in the room" is an English metaphorical idiom for an obvious truth that is being ignored or goes unaddressed. The idiomatic expression also applies to an obvious problem or risk no one wants to discuss.[1]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elephant_in_the_room

It is based on the idea that an elephant in a room would be impossible to overlook; thus, people in the room who pretend the elephant is not there have chosen to avoid dealing with the looming big issue.

The "see the elephant" meant to see the terrors of the unknown. There were mammoth bones found in the Western Plains back in the 1830's, but no one ever saw any elephants. People who crossed the plains said they were off to "see the elephant". Elephants were sen as large and scary, the way we now see T Rex's.

The Republican Party was referred to as the elephant as a symbol scare the slaveholders and their allies in the Eastern business elite. The elephant destroyed the Whig Party coalition of Capitalists, militarists and slaveholders.

The gorilla has a different origin in a different expression:
"800 pound gorilla" is an American English expression for a person or organization so powerful that it can act without regard to the rights of others or the law.[1] The phrase is rooted in a riddle:

"Where does an 800 lb. gorilla sleep?"

The answer:

"Anywhere it wants to."

This highlights the disparity of power between the "800 lb. gorilla" and everything else.

The term can describe a powerful geopolitical and military force, or, in business, a powerful corporate entity that has such a large majority percentage of whatever market they compete within that they can use that strength to crush would-be competitors. (The metaphor includes an inherent bit of hyperbole; the highest weight yet recorded for an actual gorilla is 600 lb (270 kg).)

The metaphor has been mixed, on occasion, with the metaphor of the elephant in the room, as in TV advertisements by the financial firm AXA Equitable broadcast in 2010.[2] In 2011 former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee referred to the healthcare plan instituted by former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney as "the 800-pound elephant in the room".[3]

[sirs]

So a gorilla is not racist but a chimp is. Who knew.

Never said that.  Nice try though, JJ

[BT]

Oh

Then who said this?

if it were racist, it'd been more of a moneky,

and this:

If one wanted to actually make it racist, it would have been a small monkey, or even chimp perhaps.

[sirs]

That was me...and it still applies.  Using a gorilla in this context wasn't racist.  You pulled a JJ, and saw racism where there wasn't any.  The cartoon was no different than an elephant in the courtROOM.  The gorilla was just more menacing looking, as it looks upon the constitution it wants to shred.  An Elephant doesn't quite elicit the same immiment destructive force as the gorilla. 

Now, if Obama's facse was superimposed on the gorilla, then maybe you'd have a leg to stand on

But by all means, please check out the author's archive and demonstrate a pattern of using monkeys/gorillas in his toons, when criticizing Obama.....or ANY black for that matter.  That's your burdon of proof to validate the asanine notion that the toon was racist

[BT]

So now that you admit you said it, could you explain why a monkey or chimp is racist, but a gorilla would not be?

[Xavier_Onassis]

There are rather a lot of primates.

 Calling people some primate names can be insulting, but not others.

If you call a person a lemur, he is unlikely to be offended. No one calls anyone an orangutan, so far as I know.

If you call him a baboon, it is insulting, but not racially insulting.

It is racially insulting to call Black people monkeys, apes and to a lesser degree, chimps.

Generally you call a person a "gorilla" because he is very large and has apelike features.

What is insulting and what is not depends on the language and the culture. Eskimos (who prefer to be called Inuits) refer to those they really do not like as "walruses".

[sirs]

So now that you admit you said it, could you explain why a monkey or chimp is racist, but a gorilla would not be?

NEVER SAID A GORILLA COULDN'T BE.  MERELY THAT IT WASN'T IN THIS CASE, GIVEN THE CONTEXT IT WAS USED IN

Now that we have that cleared up, please demonstrate how this toon is racist, by way of demonstrating a pattern used by this cartoonist, when depicting blacks in particular and Obama specifically

Ball in your court.  Unless of course you're going to claim JJ status and just proclaim it is, because....it just is