Cartoonists are complicated and sometimes conflicted people. The legendary Walt Kelly who reflected the American condition in his Okefenokee Swamp was described as a combination of gentleness and fearlessness.
In a time when American society valued homogeneity and the post-war development of a stable middle class, Kelly stood his Pogo the Possum up against the ultra right wing John Birch Society in the form of the “Jack Acid Society,” the Ku Klux Klan in the form of the “Kluck Klams,” and Sen. Joe McCarthy as “Simple Joe Malarkey.”
For a man who evoked such chuckles from his readers, Kelly apparently drowned his worst sorrows in scotch and milk (the milk to soothe his ulcers). One clergyman who knew Kelly said the cartoonist whipped out his checkbook one day when Kelly was mourning the murder of some missionaries and wrote a contribution, muttering: “If they can make me give all that money to my [expletive deleted] wife and my [expletive deleted] kids, I can give some of it to you. And it is for you, not your [expletive deleted] church.”
Although most Pogo fans remember only the 1971 quote from a Pogo on the first Earth Day, “We have met the enemy and he is us,” the original of that shortened version gives context to its pithiness. In the introduction of his book The Pogo Papers in 1952, Kelly wrote: “Resolve then, that on this very ground, with small flags waving and tinny blasts on tiny trumpets, we shall meet the enemy, and not only will he be ours, he may be us.”
Ah. And perhaps we will shoot ourselves in the foot.
Reader advocates and ombudsmen from papers across the country have heard from subscribers during the past several weeks about the cartoon “The Boondocks” that substituted a written protest over the war for its regular strip on March 29.
The Boston Globe was the only major newspaper in the nation that pulled the strip for that day. About six of the 275 papers that run the strip asked the syndicator for a substitute strip. The Salt Lake Tribune ran the protest strip. And I got to hear from those of you who were irritated.
One Tribune reader sent the following comment in an e-mail:
“The one concern [I have] is about the comic strip ‘Boondocks.’ I have never liked it, and did not read it, until he/she got my attention the day the strip was covered by an anti-war banner. Since then, I have read it and noted its vehemence. ‘Doonesbury’ often presents similar views, but, in a way, I find less offensive.”
That paragraph sums up what I heard from about 75 readers.
So let’s ponder the American cartoonist. First, they normally are not the amusing people we imagine. I heard Al Capp speak one time in college and he was one of the most angry people I have ever witnessed. This one-legged man who created such a lovable character in “Lil’ Abner” was full of rage. He apparently is not alone in the pantheon of cartoonists.
Second, “Boondocks” may be so controversial because it characters look too benign to form such angry thoughts. Even “Doonesbury” always political has characters that are absurd enough to make the thoughts palatable. Some callers say they believe “Boondocks” is racist. That’s a tough epithet but the tone of the cartoon might be the cartoonist’s biggest problem.
In an interview with the satirical online newspaper The Onion, Aaron McGruder, the strip’s author, discussed his relationship with his comic syndicate, saying: “You do whatever you think is funny, and the syndicate comes in and raises a flag when they think something is going to cause cancellations. Then ultimately it’s my call whether or not to go ahead with it. If it gets soft or whatever, it doesn’t really bother me. I’ve never wanted to do controversy for its own sake… . What I don’t want is for controversy to be the gimmick of the strip.”
The last few weeks the controversy has eclipsed the strip.
A great cartoon is a combination of the drawing styles, the characters and the voice displayed in the daily panels. For some reason, that combination in “Boondocks” troubles some readers.
Although the comic strip is not my favorite, I defend McGruder’s right to draw it as he might. But the cartoonist might consider how he could create a world ala the Okefenokee Swamp of Pogo’s world for his point of view. Two black children plopped in the suburbs from the inner city might be too close to reality for his satire to work well.
Imagine the conversations in “Boondocks” if the main characters were two Black Moor goldfish in a bowl making observations about the world around them. A world in which they did not participate but could see in great detail.
