Reader question:
What does this headline – Obama's race is the 'elephant' in the voter booth – mean? What "elephant" are we talking about?
My comments:
The phrase in question here is the "elephant in the voter booth", and it's a metaphorical elephant as well.
The headline means this: Barrack Obama (the Democratic frontrunner for the next Presidency in the United States) is black. And his race is going to be a thorny issue – an issue Americans will find hard to ignore. It's an issue that's kind of taboo. However, this time American voters can no longer sidestep this question.
The question essentially is this: Are Americans ready for a black President?
First, definitions. Elephants are big, huge, enormous, gigantic, gargantuan animals. An elephant in the voter booth is hardly the easiest thing to ignore, speaking the obvious. However, if they could, I think people probably would ignore the animal. Elephants and things of that size and nature are hard to wrestle with, that's why people want to ignore them if they could instead of confronting them face to face.
The original idiom is in fact "elephant in the room". Likewise, an elephant in the room is hard to ignore or sidestep, but at the same time it's hard to come to terms with. Hence, the elephant in the room becomes a metaphor for any subject matter that is taboo, thorny and contentious. It could be either people or issues – taboo and controversial people or issues that we want to but can't simply sweep under the carpet.
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