Racist Canadian NHL cartoons appalling

I came across these cartoons of former Ottawa Senator and current Philadelphia Flyer goalie, Ray Emery. Needless to say, I was pretty shocked and disgusted that A) these kinds of cartoons are still being made today and B) the editor of a big newspaper allowed these cartoons to be published.

The cartoons, drawn by Tim Dolighan of the, Toronto Sun, depict Emery, one of the 2% of African Americans in the National Hockey League, as a monkey or an ape.

The first, titled 'Playoff Monkey,' was drawn after the Senators lost in the Stanley Cup Finals to the Anaheim Ducks. Emery did not play at the top of his game in the championship series, and of course, Dolighan saw it fit to draw a cartoon of a monkey holding a noose that says 'choke' on it. Wow, very impressive.


The second, titled 'Back to the Future,' was drawn after Emery was released by the Senators a year later after he got into trouble for showing up late to a few practices and became on distraction on and off the ice. I guess the idea behind the cartoon is to unnecessarily poke fun at Emery once he was no longer in Canada?


The final cartoon, titled 'Devolution,' was drawn after Emery signed with the Philadelphia Flyers as a free agent in 2009. I would explain it, but the only explanation of this cartoon can be read in the caption at the top. Unbelievable.


These cartoons from Dolighan seem to detract from research done about editorial cartoons in recent years. In a study about the effects of the cartoon The Boondocks, Nancy Cornwell and Mark Orbe said "Early comic strips tended to present more derogatory images of minorities, but recent strips reflect a more representative and sophisticated look at society and its cultural/political practices." Clearly Dolighan hasn't received that memo.

I'm going to assume the only way Dolighan was able to get away with these blatantly racist cartoons is because the publication is in Canada. If these cartoons were in an American publication I can't imagine the backlash. But I am surprised this was not made a bigger deal by ESPN or any other news outlet.

Citation: Cornwell, N. C. and Orbe, M. P., "Keepin' it Real and/or "Sellin' Out to the Man": African American Responses to Aaron McGruder's The Boondocks (2002). New Yor, New York. Routledge.