Tintin's Problematic Past

I loved the Tintin comics when I was a young lad, and they still hold a place of affection in my heart. Recently controversy seems to be swirling around the publication of 'Tintin in the Congo', one of the two early Tintin works that had never been previously printed in English (along with 'Tintin in the Land of the Soviets'). The author/illustrator of the comics, Herge himself had distanced himself from these early works before his death in 1983.

The works were problematic firstly because they were written as propaganda pieces - the one meant to educate Belgian youth about the evils of communism; the other meant to illustrate the benefits of Belgian colonialism. It is the second that has drawn opprobrium, with the Commission for Racial Equality in England insisting that it is not suitable for sale to children due to its use of offensive racial stereotypes. The other reason they are problematic, was because they were created as a comic strip for a far right Belgian newspaper that became the mouthpiece of the Belgian fascist party in the 1930s, and whose leading lights were collaborators with the Nazi occupation in World War 2. (For an interesting discussion of Herge, Tintin and his changing relationship with fascism, check out this informative article in the Guardian.)

For a taste of Tintin in the Congo, check out this excerpt. Interestingly enough, this is from the revised version from which Herge removed even more objectionable sequences such as when Tintin educates the natives about their motherland - Belgium. (This brings to mind the Algerian-French movie Indigienes (Days of Glory) in which North African troops sign up to fight to liberate the 'fatherland' from the Germans in World War 2). Despite these changes, Herge was happy for the titles to drop into obscurity, calling them "sins of my youth".

Herge often revised many of his works. The Land of Black Gold originally had a storyline set in Mandate Palestine with a three way war between the Zionist Irgun, Arabs and the British. The story was dropped, incomplete, because Herge considered it impolitic to continue the story under Nazi rule. After the end of WW2 he went back and rewrote the story, setting it in a fictional Arab country and leaving out the Irgun. In Tintin and the Shooting Star, anti-semitic scenes of Jews celebrating the impending end of the world because they will not have to repay their debts were cut, and the evil New York Jewish millionaire Blumenstein was changed to a banker named Bohlwinkel from fictional Sao Rico.

The condemnation of Tintin in Congo and the move by some bookshops to remove it from the children's section and stock it in the adult graphic novels section has been condemned with histrionic cries of censorship and 'political correctness gone insane' as well as 'left Nazism' etc.

But personally I think its the right thing to do. While the gentler racism of some of the later Tintin works can grate, there is much in the books to recommend them for kids, particularly Tintin's insistence on support for the underdogs and the oppressed, and a growing awareness of some of the issues of race in some of the books (attributed to Herge's friendship with the real life Chang Chong-Chen). As the Guardian article puts it:

It was a meeting, a friendship, which was to change Hergé’s life. All of a sudden, Tintin appeared to grow up. In China, in the story called Blue Lotus, he begins by defending a rickshaw driver who has had an accident with a westerner, who beats him, shouting, "Dirty little Chinaman! To barge into a white man!" Later, the white man complains to his friends, "What’s the world coming to? Can’t we even teach that yellow rabble to mind their manners now? It’s up to us to civilise the savages!"

But Tintin in Congo is a different kettle of fish - an outright propaganda piece written to promote the civilising mission of Belgian rule in Congo. Anyone who has read Adam Hochschild's book, 'King Leopold's Ghost' about the horrors of Belgian rule in the Congo would be as disgusted with Tintin in Congo as they would by a comic that promoted Nazi rule and its mission to promote 'racial purity'. The genocides perpetuated by both regimes were, after all, similar in scale. (6 million by the Nazis, 8 million by the Belgians.)

Personally I think its right to keep it in the adult comic books section rather than the kiddie section of the bookstore. Parents are free to buy it for their children, but at least they will be aware that there is problematic content in it of which they should be aware.

What's interesting is reading all the angry posts online railing against PC-ness. Many go on to say things like there is nothing racist about the book, or assert that colonialism was such a wonderful thing and look what a mess the Africans are in without our benevolent hands guiding their lives etc.

Sad.

Here's an excellent blog article on the affair.

IZ