Analyse d'un Cartoon: In the Rubber Coils

“In the Rubber Coils”

The 27-year brutal regime of King Leopold II led to the genocide of Congolese people with a death toll of an estimated 30 million. The political cartoon “In The Rubber Coils” clearly shows the pain suffered by the people of Congo during this colonization period. The ferocious snake symbolizes King Leopold II, the leader of Belgium from 1865-1909 and the man, fighting for his life, symbolizes the common Congolese people. This cartoon was published by “Punch magazine”, a British weekly magazine of humor and satire, in 1906. Here, we are able to depict how this British magazine is trying to illustrate how colonization often leads to exploitation. This exemplifies how King Leopold II has abused his power in order to take control over the people. The political cartoon puts an emphasis on how the snake enveloping the man and suffocating him is analogous to Leopold’s oppression in Congo.

King Leopold II promised civilization, promised slave trade abolition and promised safety to the Congolese. Instead of keeping those promises, he formed the “Force Publique”, a military force conceived in 1985 enforcing violence in the “Congo Free State”. In this cartoon, the King of the Belgians is presented as a snake. Since the beginning of times, the snake had always been symbolized as ‘evil’. In the case of Adam and Eve, the snake represented evil as it tempted Eve into eating the forbidden fruit. This demonstrated how God cursed the snake above all animals. King Leopold II is represented as the evil side. The snake, with its head replaced by Leopold’s, is shown to be crushing the man to death and the man is helpless; he can’t protect himself, as he has no weapons with him to kill the snake. It tells that out of helplessness the people of this country had to follow the orders of King Leopold II and if they couldn’t satisfy him, the result was their suffering death.

This political sketch is opposing Civilization, to brutally suffocating it, and is indicating the leader of the Belgian Empires stranglehold on the country. It gives a sensation that the King is viciously mistreating the Congolese.

The interesting aspect of this cartoon is the fact that an English Magazine company published it. At that time, many European countries were fighting for colonies. Although many of the nations were expanding their empires with brute force, they still tried to keep a clean reputation in the eyes of the rest of the world. England’s purpose in this political drawing is to downgrade the world’s vision on Belgium while at the same time ameliorating theirs. The reason to show Belgium as a country that mistreats and murders in Africa is for England to be able to keep their social status as a country that “helped” African nations.

The title of this political cartoon: “ In the Rubber Coils” is meant to illustrate the real reason that Belgium invaded Congo, which was initially an interest in ivory but which transformed into an interest in rubber. The dreadful king turned his "Congo Free State" into a massive labor camp, made a fortune for himself from the harvest of its wild rubber, and contributed in a large way to the death of millions of innocent people. Also, in the background of the drawing, there is a woman running away with the child in her arms. She is frightened by King Leopold and frightened

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