A Branch Covidian Advent Calender, 3 Dec.
Remember to Cancel Your Subscription for the Augsburger Allgemeine Zeitung!
I suppose today’s first Sunday this advent needs no explanation.
I’ll get you, anti-vaxxer!
[The ‘game’ box reads] Covidstrike: Ego Shooter Game of the Year.
[Caption] The top-seller under the Christmas Tree.
Source: Augsburger Allgemeine Zeitung, 20 Nov. 2021.
Oh, lest I forget, here’s what the Jesus said (Mark 12:31):
‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.
I literally cannot see that cartoon as other than a rebuke to the covidians. The idea that someone would create that, and people would read it, identifying with the attitude of the guy playing the game … it just doesn’t seem possible. If that was really meant to rally the readers to the cause of the vax … I shudder.
You've highlighted the publisher, but what about the illustrators - Achim Greser (1961) und Heribert Lenz (1958) - celebrated German cartoonists and more prominently regularly featured in the Frankfurter Allgemeinen Zeitung (FAZ).
I suppose one might generously appraise their cartoon as a scathing critique of the animosity toward the unvaccinated which had become so prevalent in the media and society at the time. On the other hand, how does it differentiate itself from such sentiments and how could they defend it from accusations of contributing to the climate of hate and dehumanisation of the unvaccinated?
A quick internet search reveals other cartoons of theirs which obviously satirise some of the other pandemic measures (social distancing/etc.), so I suspect they are "equal opportunity" satirists. No doubt they would argue "Satire darf alles" (satire means no holds barred ) and claim an artistic (and freedom of speech) right to test the limits of acceptable social discourse even to the point of offending.
So I am a little torn on this one. I obviously feel sick at the extent of dehumanisation "acceptably" depicted (in one of my local newspapers!) and simultaneously I am aware the artists may have been trying to hold up a mirror to society at the time.