
Hutchinson - A Tea Party group, Hutchinson-based Patriot Freedom Alliance, has defended its depiction of Obama as a skunk on its website. The image drew accusation of racism from the NAACP, but the group said this was not racism but satire.
The Patriot Freedom Alliance, according to The Hutchinson News, carries the image of skunk on its website. The website says the skunk is in place of the eagle as symbol of the president of the U.S.
Thomas Hymer, who maintains the website, defended the skunk image of Obama, saying it is only satire and not racism. According to Thomas Hymer, President Barack Obama is like a skunk because a skunk is "half black and half white and everything that the skunk does stinks." Thomas Hymer admits, however, that his satire is "in a politically incorrect form."
The Hutchinson News reports that the local NAACP president Darrell Pope, disagrees with the group, saying that representing President Obama as "half-white, half-black skunk," is a "blatant statement of racism." According to Pope, the statement is meant to be "malicious." Pope said Tea Party supporters can "tout Herman Cain all they want" but that they are racists. Pope, according to Daily Mail, says the skunk posting is, "...proof of the kind of organization that they are, which I felt it always had racial overtones in the first place."
But local Tea Party supporter Chuck Sankey, agrees with Hymer that the skunk image is satire. According to Chuk Sankey, it makes the point that America is in trouble and that things do not "smell right." "That is what it means to me," Sankey concluded.
And as far as Sankey was concerned, using the black and white color of the Skunk to represent that President Obama is half-white and half-black is simply speaking the truth. Sankey queried: "Isn't that the truth? What's wrong with the truth?" He said further: "It may be offensive to some, of course, but in humor there is always an element of truth."
The striped skunk is half-black, half-white.
Sankey, according to AP , said calling Obama a skunk was in order because former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin has been the target of even worse insults. Hymer also said that Vice President Joe Biden's recent comment comparing Tea Party Republicans to terrorists was worse than representing President Obama as a half-white, half-black skunk.
He advised those who do not like the image not to look at it.
Daily Mail reports that the image and the caption, have since been removed from the website of the group.
Posted By: Siebra Muhammad
Monday, December 12th 2011 at 12:13PM
You can also
click
here to view all posts by this author...