In Issue 145 The Gazelle published a satirical cartoon — republished below — intended to comment on the perceived lack of tolerance for marginal viewpoints on NYU Abu Dhabi’s campus. One panel sparked criticism throughout NYUAD, from administration to students and faculty. The Gazelle’s Management Team received strong recommendations on several fronts to take down the cartoon. Initially, this controversy evoked an instinctively defensive reaction. However, ever since the cartoon was published, we have come to see this as an opportunity for discussion rather than merely a controversy for us to diffuse and then forget. The Management Team’s conversations concerning the cartoon spanned two weeks. During that time, we balanced arguments concerning cultural sensitivity, freedom of speech and our own positionality as a group of students attempting to facilitate dialogue within this community. The intention of this editorial is to embody those conversations and act as a compromise between leaving up the cartoon and unpublishing it entirely.

The contentious panel portrays a black woman at a podium expressing that she prefers McDonald’s to KFC as she is being booed off stage by the crowd. Each figure’s skin color in the cartoon was chosen at random. Understanding this panel is predicated on an understanding of fast-food delivery at NYUAD. Students often order KFC from off campus and post on NYUAD Facebook groups to share their food with the community; there is even an entire Facebook group dedicated to sharing food. Moreover, because McDonald’s does not deliver to Saadiyat Island, KFC is the student body’s fast food of choice. The chicken vendor is so popular that it has become somewhat of a trope in our community.

We recognize that there is a deeply racist history behind the caricature of African Americans, and that fried chicken has played a critical role in the development of that derogatory portrayal. However, given the diverse cultural and national backgrounds of our Management Team and that of the cartoonist, we either did not interpret the panel as portraying African Americans in particular or were not familiar with the stereotype to begin with. In editing the cartoon, we were focused on the particularly comical role of KFC in our community as part of a larger satirical piece.

In an earlier editorial we encouraged the NYUAD community to confront uncomfortable topics. We felt that taking the cartoon down for the purpose of mitigating any harm that might come to the reputation of The Gazelle or even NYUAD would be hypocritical. It is undeniable that this cartoon — even with this editorial — will offend some, but reflecting on moments of inadvertent offense to discuss the issues underlying both the offense and the subject matter is exactly what NYUAD has brought us together to do. We believe that there is the potential to learn from recognizing mistakes and biases by using them as a springboard to improve our cultural understanding.

We want to encourage the community — faculty, staff and students — to consider why they found the cartoon racist or why they did not. In a community that is expected to be accepting and adopt mutual understanding of its enormous cultural diversity, how can we disagree so fundamentally about whether or not this cartoon is racist?

We do not stand behind hate speech. We do not defend portrayals of any racial group that serve to offend or sensationalize issues in the name of free speech or comedy. We do not mean to trivialize potential interpretations of this cartoon as racist. We want to emphasize that because of NYUAD’s varied cultural backgrounds, there are many justifiable interpretations that do not pertain to race. We think that the question of how students deal with substantively different points of cultural reference is one that we need to grapple with — not shy away from.

Had this cartoon been published at NYU New York instead of NYUAD, perhaps a reading of the last panel that took into account a history of African American stereotypes and biases would have been clear to the editors immediately. Conversely, if we were operating within a community without any ties to the U.S. at all, perhaps this would never have been a point of contention in the first place. In short, not all students will recognize what represents to others a very real affront. Because NYUAD operates in such a unique cultural space — with students approaching issues from fundamentally different perspectives — we must ask what a universal standard of understanding of cultural common knowledge would look like? If there can be one? And if so, would it even be justified?

A substantial portion of The Gazelle’s readership comes from the U.S. Members of our own community have dealt with and continue to face the very oppression and dehumanizing rhetoric that some attributed to the last panel of the cartoon. As such, we understand the deeply sensitive nature of the portrayal. Still, we were unable to decide among ourselves what constituted the best way forward. Should we take down the cartoon? Change the skin color of the person in the last panel? None of the options available felt satisfactory or justifiable. It is precisely because of this uncertainty that we realized the importance of having this conversation.

Are any of us in a position to plead ignorance about the cultural sensitivities of other nations? If something is deeply offensive within the U.S. American context, should we expect everyone at NYUAD to understand, anticipate and share that offense? In a place with hundreds of conceptions of race and ethnicity, how do we decide what is unacceptable and what is equivocal?

We do not claim to have the answers to these questions, or even to know whether or not they have a necessary truth to them. The Management Team of The Gazelle continues to disagree about these issues. Still, we maintain that this is a discussion worth having and we invite you to continue to engage in this debate with us.

Hatim Benhsain is a contributing illustrator. Email him at feedback@thegazelle.org.