Workingmen's
Wednesday, October 22, 2014
A Brief Look at Some Interracial Propaganda
This image is a prime example of racism fueled propaganda. Like any other propaganda, it's driving off the fear of the unknown and using that lack of knowledge to introduce full blown lies. It loosely attempts to veil its hate speech in a form similar to a public service announcement. The poster is trying to convince white people that taking the bus will result in you being assaulted by a black person. That buses must be filled with savages that want to rape and eat your innocent white students.
What I found interesting about this piece was the two angles in fear mongering it takes. Not only are these "savage blacks" supposed to extort, rape, and eat you, they'll seduce your white daughters into interracial relationships and bare mixed race children. Which is apparently very bad, despite no real reasoning behind it. The terms "interracial sex" and "A race of mulattoes" are obviously attempting to shock the audience or at least frame in a way that should be opposed. Though oddly enough the picture is of two very natural and happy looking interracial couples embracing eachother. I cant help but think that the image they chose is betraying the message they're trying to get across.
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Really good point about the arguable dissonance between word and image, Michael. Do you have any contextual info on the flyer--i.e., where, when, and by whom it would have been circulated?
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