Judge — September 11, 1915 — page 9: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This cartoon satirizes class pretension and snobbery. A mounted polo player speaks to a boy, dismissing golf and tennis as mere "fun" while declaring polo "the only man's sport." The satire targets the wealthy elite's belief in polo's superiority—polo was an expensive sport requiring horses and access to exclusive clubs, affordable only to the very rich. The joke mocks this attitude's absurdity: the speaker dismisses two legitimate sports as inferior simply because polo's exclusivity and cost made it a status symbol among the upper class. By presenting this claim so matter-of-factly, the cartoonist ridicules the pretentiousness of wealthy men who used sporting choices to assert social dominance and masculine superiority. The crowd of onlookers suggests the public spectacle of such aristocratic posturing.