Mexico Denies Stamps Are Racist

Black Comic Book Character Resembles Racial Stereotype

(CBS/AP)  Memin Pinguin's name combines a monicker for "Guillermo," or "William," and a slang form of an adjective meaning "mischievous." On the stamps, which sell for a bit more than US$0.60 apiece, is seen primping in a tuxedo and top-hat, marching off to school, and hawking comic books.

Jackson said the stamps were worse than Fox's comment last month.

Carlos Munoz, a professor emeritus at the Department of Ethnic Studies at the University of California at Berkeley, said "people in the Fox administration, and perhaps even Fox himself, need a lesson in African contribution to Mexican history."

"It's a manifestation of the ignorance, of the racism that continues to exist in Mexican culture," Munoz said. "Mexico, like the USA, is a very racist society. Mexico has just been more successful at ignoring its African culture than the U.S."

A statement released by the Mexican Postal Service said that the Education Minister of the Philippines decreed the Memin Pinguin comic book required reading in 1985 because of its "promotion in the students of respect toward family and institutions."