Colonel Gaddafi Flips His Finger at the World

FLIPPING THE BIRD: Libyan tyrant Colonel Gaddafi poses as KFC's Colonel Sanders as he declines the advice of global leaders to step down.

JERM's newspaper, The New Age, pulled the cartoon on grounds that it was "over the top" and "defamatory towards KFC". Defending the cartoon, the cartoonist says, "(it) is obviously leveraging off the KFC acronym and "colonel" platform, as is often the nature of parodies and other such culture jams (of which there are countless examples).  I strongly doubt that readers are not smart enough to see that the cartoon is mocking Gaddafi, particularly because it's so in-your-face and fairly far removed from the original KFC branding.

As an aside, you might recall the Constitutional Court judgement in 2005 where both Justice Dikgang Moseneke and Albie Sachs ruled that corporate trademarks are in the public domain and, almost always, can not be protected, especially where satire is concerned".

[Click on the keywords "Culture Jamming" next to the cartoon to see other cartoons on this site where logos, corporate identities and brands have been subverted for the purpose of social or political commentary. Jerm's 'Mugg & Bean' and 'Johnnie Walker' cartoons are particularly good examples of culture jamming].

WHAT DO YOU THINK? Is this form of commentary fair game? What are your feelings about this particular example, where Colonel Sander's persona has been used to make a comment about Colonel Gaddafi? Please share your views in the comments section below.

PLEASE CLICK ON THE FOLLOWING LINK TO SEE AND VOTE FOR THE AFRICARTOON LOERIE AWARDS 2011: http://africartoons.com/cartoon/5070?filter=8457