Oddity

The KKK's costume (call it a uniform if you like) has something intrinsically comic about it. From my point of view a grown up with a sack on his body and head could never be menacing. It is the ideas behind the Cuckoo Clan that are worrying and criticisable. Let's face it. Had this been a Boy Scout uniform in lieu of being that of a supremacist, racist group of bigot fanatics it would be much funnier than it actually is. Put the uniform in a different context though. Put the white supremacists donning their silly uniforms on a ferris wheel posing for a group photo on and around the entertainment contraption. It's not just odd. It's almost hilarious. Almost. For behind those masks there still lie minds full of obnoxious hate and willingness to spread terror on their "inferiors".

This photo from this blog inspired this blogpost. Put something out of context and suddenly all that it means or represents is placed head over heels. Do that constantly and suddenly any threat, menace or meaning it might originally have will actually be nullified and replaced by the new ridiculous caricature. Repetitive instances of caricaturisation can have long term damaging effects.

Now why do I suddenly find myself thinking about Malta's stance in the EU about divorce? Why do I find myself wondering whether we will ever slip out of this caricature perpetrated by the holier-than-themselves Nationalists and the once-bitten-twice-shy Labourites?

"Gadzooks and Gee Whizz 'arry... that darn wheel sure gave me head a fine ol'spinnin... Ah'm left 'ere feelin' giddy an' all that. Another o' dem spins 'n my codger'll staht thinkin' like some doggone gawliwawg... "