Ever noticed most animated and cartoon characters have only four fingers – well, three and a thumb?
The four finger rendering preference of animators is called the ‘four-finger aesthetic’.
Originally cartoon characters were hand-drawn with four fingers to save time, but more so money!
Online you can read various justifications and excuses for drawing cartoon characters with only four fingers: tradition, simplification, the characters are not human, the hardest part of the body to draw is the hand, efficiency of resources, etc.
But hand-drawn and painted cartoon animation has been eclipsed and made obsolete by the advent of digitally created 3D computer-generated imagery (CGI).
So this begs the question as to why Japanese anime characters are rendered with five fingers on each hand whilst animated sitcoms like The Simpsons continue to feature their characters with only four fingers?
Children with four fingers or missing limbs, through no fault of their own, are often the target of ridicule, they are demeaned, bullied – ostracised!
Given the producers of The Simpsons – Gracie Films and 20h Century Fox Television – recently caved in to criticisms of character and racial stereotyping by announcing that non-white characters will no longer be voiced by white actors, why do they continue to offend and mock the disabled, deformed and amputees like myself by continuing to render animated characters with four fingers?
Time for The Simpsons to finally grow-up and the producers to recognise that four-fingered cartoon characters are a tool for bullying and there is no place for them on our screens!
“D’OH!”
Revisions:
Article originally published 14 July 2020. Revised: 30 November 2023; 16 January 2023; 4 January 2022.