The Wasp — 1888 — page 232: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This cartoon satirizes a fashionable woman confronting someone (likely a Chinese immigrant or servant) about keeping "exotic" pets or specimens. The woman, dressed in elaborate 1880s attire with a feathered hat, appears shocked or disapproving at the figure's collection of caged animals and curiosities—including what appears to be a owl and other creatures in containers labeled "Record of the Experiences of the Oldest Inhabitants." The satire likely mocks San Francisco's anti-Chinese sentiment of this era, presenting the woman's class-conscious protests against "foreign" practices as hypocritical. The cartoon appears to critique nativist attitudes by presenting her fashionable disapproval of the other figure's cultural practices as pretentious. The title "San Francisco Protests" suggests commentary on contemporary social tensions.