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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe cartoon hillbilly - by Tom Tomorrow
?1399892843http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/05/12/1298731/-Cartoon-The-cartoon-hillbilly
HughBeaumont
(24,461 posts)K&R.
randys1
(16,286 posts)myrna minx
(22,772 posts)Walk away
(9,494 posts)The possibilities are almost unthinkable!
Hassin Bin Sober
(26,344 posts)Tsiyu
(18,186 posts)but Bundy ain't no hillbilly.
Hillbillies are poor, hillbillies are humble and hillbillies are no more nor less racist than any other group.
Also, hillbillies are not Mormon ranchers.
Just another hippy-hillbilly here, living in the guts of poor Appalachia.
Love ya Tom but you got your facts a little off on this one
nxylas
(6,440 posts)While Bundy was obviously the immediate inspiration, it was a comment on the wider Republican tendency to make folk heroes out of somewhat ridiculous figures.
Tsiyu
(18,186 posts)That's all, and because pretending that the problem is poor mountain people - and not rich fucks like the Kochsuckers and FOX Noos and Limpballs - takes the onus off the affluent sociopaths and places the blame on the least of these.
It does nothing to shine a light, only obscures reality
YMMV
theHandpuppet
(19,964 posts)I'm tired of biting my tongue.
Tsiyu
(18,186 posts)"sophisticated" types have no clue how absolutely ignorant this cartoon is
theHandpuppet
(19,964 posts)Why is name-calling the poor still okay even among "progressives"?
Posted by theHandpuppet in Poverty
Fri Aug 04th 2006, 10:46 AM
I'm posting this rant on the Poverty Forum because I don't dare post it on GD. I've brought this subject up before only to be met with outright hostility. Am I the only person who is sick and tired of a certain kind of name-calling that goes on throughout the "progressive" community here? Why is it that folks who otherwise identify themselves as politically enlightened think it's okay to refer to their political foes as "trailer trash", "stupid hillbillies" et al?
This is really, really bothering me and I'm having a hard time keeping a lid on my anger. I am Appalachian and a proud Scottish/German Jewish, college educated, progressive lesbian "hillbilly" who grew up as a "river rat" but has been an activist since I was involved in publishing an anti-war newsletter at 15 and helped lead a mass walkout of my high school to protest the Vietnam War. I am DAMNED SICK AND TIRED of every bozo Repuke being dismissed as some "toothless, ignorant hillbilly" when a majority of the people throwing those perjoratives around wouldn't know a hillbilly if they woke up next to one in the morning.
If you dare to object to this kind of name-calling you're called thin-skinned or told to "lighten up". Well, I'm not going to "lighten up." The poor are not our enemies, the powerless are not our enemies, the hungry or uneducated are not our enemies. The ones pulling the strings in this country can be found among the uber rich and their corporate allies. They can have Ivy-League educations. They live in the best homes. They're still scumbags. I'll proudly take my poor hillbilly neighbors any day over their kind of trash.
I had to grow up with that kind of hurtful name-calling and I'm totally sick of hearing this on DU. It's a kind of class warfare that turns my stomach. So what can you do?
Tsiyu
(18,186 posts)county, Obama got about 45% of the vote, which is a higher percentage than in many of those upscale suburban enclaves in which many of the hillbilly-denigraters live.
The term is like the n word, to me. I call myself one proudly, but don't you call me that as a pejorative or blame the political climate on the hillbilly.
Most of the geeks who showed up to Bundyville probably live in Suburbia anyway. That's why they can afford to leave for a time and why they want a back-to-the-land experience.
True hillbillies are too poor to leave home, and they have their own places to tend to without worrying about some Mormon rancher's cattle.
I love what you wrote there, too. I know it's cool to have SOMEONE to denigrate and I guess I choose teabaggers, but I know they are comfy suburbanites, not people struggling to survive.
Not funny at all.
Tsiyu
(18,186 posts)As if a Mormon would brag about making shine!
This makes true hillbillies just CRINGE.
There were other examples he could have used.
I work helping these people I love. They are shit on by everybody. So to equate their lives to some Welfare Cowboy's life is just ridiculously uneducated and WRONG.
"Let's just demonize these poor folks even more!"
smiley
(1,432 posts)and I'm not offended in the least by this brilliant piece of political satire.
Just sayin....
Art_from_Ark
(27,247 posts)and the names of my junior high and high school sports teams were, respectively, the Ridgerunners and the Mountaineers. The Tom Tomorrow cartoon doesn't offend me in the least, either
Jim Lane
(11,175 posts)He didn't refer to a typical hillbilly but to a "cartoon" hillbilly. Along with slamming the right wing media for hypocrisy and Benghazi derangement syndrome, he was pointing out how they're happy to grab a caricature when it suits their purposes.
Count me as one city dweller who didn't react to the toon in the way you condemn.
Tsiyu
(18,186 posts)eppur_se_muova
(36,299 posts)real hillbillies are too sophisticated to represent Teabagger thinking.
Ditto for cavemen, while we're at it.
Tsiyu
(18,186 posts)It's just kinda silly to represent a Mormon desert rancher with hundreds of cattle as a mountain poor man.
One of my pet peeves is hatin' on hillbillies. I am in the business of helping them. And most in my poor community are Democrats
eppur_se_muova
(36,299 posts)my mom is from WV, and gets tired of the crap she hears about WVans, so I know what you're referring to.
Oh, and hey, living in AL brings its own rewards ...
Tsiyu
(18,186 posts)I love Snuffy Smiff, don't get me wrong. It's in fun.
But Bundy is not that character.
Whether SS was a stand-in for any generic cartoon character is questionable to me simply because I've seen people who probably have never met a hillbilly give them all sorts of unfair attributes - effectively being just as bigoted as the true bigots they seek to condemn.
Whenever we make the poor the object of scorn, or pretend they are the cause of conflict or political exploitation, we're choosing to let the true guilty parties off the hook.
And Alabamians know the only true white lightning comes from these parts! How dare they associate Bundy with moonshine, dammit!
This is an outrage! Just in case!
Eleanors38
(18,318 posts)Tsiyu
(18,186 posts)There were better choices.
Edit to add: Snuffy is a pretty peaceful guy now, although he was not always so and was once a caricature of a racist wife beater, but Yosemite Sam the gunslinger is more appropriate.
What's done is done, but I just get tired of hearing the word hillbilly used incorrectly
mdbl
(4,976 posts)I know a few hillbillies that the cartoon definitely represents. And yes,they are family.
lunasun
(21,646 posts)Gothmog
(145,619 posts)BlancheSplanchnik
(20,219 posts)Perfect. Love how that's his name, too....Cartoon Hillbilly.
Cartoon Caveman.
Cuz that's what pukes understand. Cartoonish simplification. Lowest common denominator.
Archae
(46,354 posts)There was a editorial cartoon during the Bush years called "I Drew This."
He drew one where Bush acted like he was "He-Man" while Osama and Saddam were drawn as the cartoon bad guys.
Auggie
(31,194 posts)callous taoboy
(4,590 posts)this was a brilliant cartoon. Tomorrow really knows how to accentuate, but then make murky, parallels between the stuffed shirt morons and the just plain morons.
LiberalLovinLug
(14,176 posts)...Larious as usual
Us liberals may not have the MSM on our side in general, but we got the political cartoonists, at least the funny ones.
DirkGently
(12,151 posts)MisterP
(23,730 posts)Response to kpete (Original post)
Name removed Message auto-removed
Champion Jack
(5,378 posts)heaven05
(18,124 posts)of the current rethug/teahadist mentality.