Equal Rights + Sexual Minorities 1 | Page 36

Traditional Marriage Team Member Name: Devin Fowles Publication: Salt Lake Tribune Date: 4/29/2015 Cartoonist: Pat Bagley, U.S. Title of cartoon: Traditional Marriage Cartoon# 16 What action is taking place in the cartoon? What is the context? As noted before in other cartoons, this cartoon was specifically drawn because of the controversy of legalizing gay marriage. This topic has been discussed at great length for the last few year and has crawled its way to the top mindset of almost everyone, especially in the united states, when it was declared legal in all fifty states June 26, 2015 (Bill Chappell, June 2015, pg 1). Pat Bagley labels each different person as a specific culture that had laws, or a least rules, against marriage of a specific type of people. What are the symbols in the cartoon? Pat Bagley used a lot of symbols here, from the caveman to the KKK member, to the priest each can be a symbol of a certain type of culture in their own way. Symbolically, each member represents a leader in their respective groups, that declared a type of marriage illegal. What “reality” is constructed/framed about your issue? The cartoon shows a scale of history. You could call it a history of unapproved marriages. In every culture it seems that there is an infidel, or a lower human population that exists only to be hated by the ‘betters’. In the cartoon we see a timeline of leaders within different cultures that preached against people who wanted to be married to the inferiors. At the end we see a priest with the saying “Same sex partners is just not natural”, condemning it as a sin. The saying that same sex marriage is not natural is framed in a way that shows the same type of thing happening throughout history and in many different cultures. This cartoon is Framed by stereotypes, Pat Bagley uses each individual character to represent a different culture that is, or has been throughout the history of the world. These stereotypes show that each culture, though very different from the others, has had a certain marriage ban on a certain type of marriage. Tone of the cartoon: 1) positive or negative framing of the issue 2) framing is supportive of or opposed to supporters 3) framing is supportive of or opposed to opponents Bibliography: Chappell, Bill. “Supreme Court Declares Same-Sex Marriage Legal In All 50 States.” NPR. NPR, 26 June 2015. Web. 29 Mar. 2016. Bagley, Pat. “CagleCartoons.com - View Image.” CagleCartoons.com - View Image. 29 Apr. 2015. Web. 30 Mar. 2016. 35 36