Talk:Tintin in the Congo

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[edit] Racism in Tintin in the Congo

I'm surprised there is not more discussion about the drawing of black characters in this book. Weren't the first ones incredibly dark with big red lips? And weren't they redrawn later on? In Canada, this particular Tintin book is the subect of a lot of contraversy, mostly because French-speaking black Canadians feel it was horribly racist. But on this page, it doesn't seem to have sparked any discussion at all. The article makes it sound as if it's just "not a big deal". The redrawing of Africans isn't even mentioned. I'm not an editor, just an observer with a question. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 205.194.74.10 (talk) 19:07, 5 January 2007 (UTC).

The book itself was redrawn and colorized, but the black people still had these coon lips and acted like big children. 惑乱 分からん * \)/ (\ (< \) (2 /) /)/ * (talk) 12:05, 3 May 2008 (UTC)
I read this one years ago and I'm still keeping it next to my other Tintin adventures (honestly, I have all of them :)) Until the time I looked at its Wikipedia article, I've never thought that it contains racism but people are seriously angry about it. Actually, I also had a problem with Hergé's political views when I first read "Tintin in the Land of the Soviets" but I just kept on loving his art. Probably, I would pay a huge amount for a redrawn-colored version of that piece, even if I find his representation of USSR silly and subjective. Deliogul (talk) 18:28, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] What racist allegation exactly?

In mid-July 2007, the UK's equal rights body etc.

I haven't actually read the book, but from the article one would assume that instances of racism have been dealt with. Does anyone who has actually read the album know what the concerns of UK's equal rights body are? Shinobu 13:13, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

This is a big thing in the media in the UK right now, so it's important that this is dealt with in the article (in case you didn't understand why it's been added). Here's the complete statement:

A hundred years ago it was common to see negative stereotypes of black people. Books contained images of 'savages', and some white people considered black people to be intellectually and socially inferior. Most people would assume that those days are behind us, and that we now live in a more accepting society. Yet here we are in 2007 with high street book shops selling 'Tintin In The Congo'. This book contains imagery and words of hideous racial prejudice, where the 'savage natives' look like monkeys and talk like imbeciles. Whichever way you look at it, the content of this book is blatantly racist. Highstreet shops, and indeed any shops, ought to think very carefully about whether they ought to be selling and displaying it. Yes, it was written a long time ago, but this certainly does not make it acceptable. This is potentially highly offensive to a great number of people. It beggars belief that in this day and age that any shop would think it acceptable to sell and display 'Tintin In The Congo.' The only place that it might be acceptable for this to be displayed would be in a museum, with a big sign saying 'old fashioned, racist claptrap'.

Hope this helps. EvilRedEye 14:11, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

This is probably the most subjective statement I've ever heard about a subjective piece of art. Talking about a work of a world renowned artist shouldn't be in this way. You can say that you don't offer young people to read it but calling it "racist claptrap" is not appropriate. Another funny thing is that, nobody says anything about the idealization of Captain Haddock, who is simply drunk all the time, in the series. Actually, Captain has been one of my favorites since the times that it was still illegal for me to drink. Deliogul (talk) 18:41, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] NPOV?

Trying to think of a neutralising argument for the controversy question that stems from any other angle than the fact it's taken 75 years for a single formalised complaint to be lodged, or the regular comparison of it being hypersensitivity and censorship of contemporary society. Can anyone assist with this? It's hard keeping neutral when your POV matches the article so I won't be of much use for that.

Interestingly my book collection contains many colonial era annuals that depict various racist epithets in all their vulgarity, but I've never once thought for a second they're 'wrong' in any way as they were the way people thought back in that era. On the same grounds I read Biggles and his interactions with various 'great white hunters' and never thought they wrong for depicting the slaughter of animals, being a vegetarian myself, I deem it as their right to hold those views and merely put it aside as the context being 'dated'. Food for thought, anyone? Jachin 09:11, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

You might struggle finding an alternate point of view from an English language source as the book appears to have had a patchy history of being released in English. It's perhaps worth noting that the first paragraph, the one that mentions general criticism is completely unsourced. EvilRedEye 11:11, 18 July 2007 (UTC)
BTW, the fake 'new messages' thing on your userpage made me chuckle. EvilRedEye 11:13, 18 July 2007 (UTC)