Lat v Zunar, Marina v Mariam: whos better?

Marina Mahathir gives serious political cartooning a bad name this week, by making a big deal in defence of Lat and putting down Zunar as an unknown. The political establishment must be feeling the heat: Zunar is the man of the moment for his pungent satires on current affairs, and the heavy-handed police action taken against him.

Why should anyone suddenly feel the need to defend Lat and put down Zunar? Last week at the book launch for Zunars latest collection, ousted Perak menteri besar Nizar Jamaluddin spoke of Zunar as being a better cartoonist than Lat, greater than Lat.

Zunar is a political cartoonist. He and Reggie Lee are the best we have for political satire at present.

But Lats not a political cartoonist. Lat is a social commentator.

The only thing Lat and Zunar have in common is that they both draw cartoons.

Biting and incisive wit and satire from Zunar, throwing a searchlight on the truth as he sees it. There are no fables in Zunars world

Nizar, being a politician, will definitely like Zunars cartoons. But he is unfair to lump Lat in the same category. And so comes Marina rushing to put Lat back on a pedestal he never asked to be on. And she rushes headlong into praising Lats great technique. Shes trying to sidestep the issue.

Their drawing skills are beside the point. Its the content that people are talking about.

Lat and Zunar are two different types of cartoonists. Just as there are different types of columnists.

Theres the Marina Mahathir type. Theres the Mariam Mokhtar type. And if you compare the two, you could say Marinas not so great.

No, Marinas not a great columnist. Mariams the better political columnist.

Mariam is sharp, perceptive, holds a firm point of view, and swings a nice turn of phrase. She rings true. People who follow politic! al and c urrent events will like her columns.

People who like Mahathir and being rich will follow Marina, the onetime professional journalist and now grand dame social activist. She waffles. She dodges. Shes evasive. Shes snide. Shes insincere. Shes totally establishment.

All that the two women columnists have in common is that they use words.

Whats to compare?

Poor Lat. Hes had this cross on his shoulders from the moment the editor of the New Straits Times opened his Asia Magazine one Sunday and found some remarkable cartoons on Malaysian life only to be told that the remarkable cartoonist of the Kampung Boy had been a crime reporter on his crime desk, right under his nose, all the while.

And after being appointed editorial cartoonist, Lat found his work being toned down or turned down by both Lee Siew Yee and by Pak Samad Ismail. It was the price he had to pay, just to have his work published.

Go along, or go away is the unwritten rule in the establishment press.

When Marina defends Lat and snidely puts down Zunar as being unknown, she is merely trying to put forward the proposition that it pays better to play along, and that the establishment side is the good side. Shes wrong.

Lat needs no defending. He stands alone and stands apart as Malaysias preeminent and most beloved cartooning social commentator. True, he is no Zunar but Zunar is no Lat, either: his work is biting, sharp and political. Like hard news, they are of the moment, with a shelf-life lasting weeks, maybe months. In years to come, the cartoons on Mongolia and submarines will be dated. But what Zunar says in his cartoons need to be said. Right now, not tomorrow, not next month.

Lats kampung life cartoons will live on. They speak of the timeless.

But for those who follow politics and important current events, Zunar is the man of the moment. His work is focused, shining a searchlight beam with a sweetly-captured thought that, at one glances, provides a blinding flash of perception.

At the book launch last week for Zunars latest collection, Peraks ousted menteri besar, Nizar Jamaludin, was emphatic that great as Lat was, Zunar was better and greater. But Nizars comment was a political statement, not literary criticism. He was upholding the anti-establishment right to dissent, and denigrating the establishment for going along.

Marina, similarly, is making a political statement, upholding the right for the well-connected to be rich and famous.

This is not kampung life. This is real life. When the establishment looks at a Lat cartoon, they see themselves as great people. When the establishment looks at a Zunar cartoon, they see themselves stripped naked. And they dont have the balls to admit it.

She tries very hard to put down Zunar and snidely says people havent heard of him. Thats an indictment of the establishment press. Would Zunar ever be published in the gutless establishment press? Who owns the press? Who lacks the courage to publish opposing views? Who shut down the newspapers? Would anyone have heard of Lat if his cartoons were published only in Gila Gila and Malaysiakini? Would anyone have heard of Marina Mahathir if her second name was not Mahathir and she could only have been published in Watan?

Marina makes a big deal of Lat but shes really praising the establishments success in blackmail: Lats thoughts died still-born so that he could continue to be published. When Marina praises Lat, she praises the establishments success in using the gag.

They love Lat for making gentle fun of their little foibles, and for being able to laugh along. They hate Zunar because he strips them of their fables.

Thats why Marina Mahathir praises Lat: his cartoons maintain the fiction that establishment people are nice people, great people. But when the establishment looks at Zunars work, they see themselves stripped naked. And they dont have the balls to face it.

2010 uppe! rcaise
Filed under: Journalism, Media
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