The RFK Book and Journalism Awards honor outstanding writing on issues that reflect Senator Robert F. Kennedy’s concerns, including human rights, social justice, and the power of individual action in the United States and around the world.
The Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights said on awarding the honor to Peter:
Cartoons can often be silly and satirical but Peter Kuper’s work is often political, personal, and persuasive. He takes aim at some of the most pressing issues of our times, with limited text or no text at all. As Kuper puts it he’s often speechless in many ways given the magnitude of the problems we are all facing. So he finds using the vernacular of comics a way to convey ideas that can break through any language barriers.
As he points out in his cartoons, while we stare at our devices, worshipping technology, waters are receding and fires burn Canada. Every dimension of climate change is explored in his work with a mixture of horror and humor.
But in his work you can also find hope. This panel shows that in the showdown between corporations and kids he’s banking on the kids who are gradually pushing back in an effort to save our environment.
I sure hope that the meaning and value of the RFK award does not become (permanently) damaged by the way that later bearers of the name have been acting.
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