BBC News is reporting that the UK’s Commission for Racial Equality is “calling on high street book[stores] to pull a Tintin adventure from its shelves over claims it is racist.”
Yes, it contains “bourgeois, paternalistic stereotypes of the period – an interpretation some readers may find offensive” (in the words of the Tintin’s UK publisher, Egmont). But surely that’s a reason to keep selling it? The stereotypes are so ridiculous that no one could possibly take them seriously. We studied the text in one of our French modules last year, for exactly this reason. It tells us exactly what the Belgian attitude to their colonies was in the early 20th century. No one’s suggesting we ban Othello because of it’s stereotypical representation of moors, are they? (It’s probably next, actually.) Are Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales anti-Christian? Ban ‘em.
The Gollywogs have been removed from Noddy. The new Famous 5 adventures showed Julian doing the washing up and Anne and George having adventures. Now, I don’t want to get on the PC-gone-crazy bandwagon (because I loathe those people, with a passion), but this is stupid. Literature – even (I’d say especially) children’s books – is an artefact of it’s time. We need to embrace the quirky stereotypes found within and educate children as to why they are wrong. Removing them altogether just prompts future generations to invent their own.
In the (somewhat bastardised) words of Voltaire, “I absolutely disagree with what you say, but I’ll defend to the death your right to say it.”
Incidentally, number five on Amazon.co.uk’s best-selling books chart right now? Tintin in the Congo, probably Tintin’s first appearance on Amazon’s chart. It’s right behind Potter and Campbell, and just in front of Richard Dawkins. There’s a joke there somewhere, but I can’t find it.