Kirk Anderson on the future of editorial cartoons
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A thoughtful introspection column by Kirk Anderson on the future of editorial cartooning. He starts out the commentary piece by stating the profession is simply in a “circle of life — the phase where the corpse is eaten by maggots and turned into dirt.”
Editorial cartoons are dying because newspapers are dying, or perhaps “adapting.” Or “entering a new phase in the circle of life.” Some of the damage is self-inflicted. Some newspapers want safe cartoons that won’t bring phone calls from advertisers, and safe cartoons are as fascinating as safe NASCAR.
To the extent we cartoonists oblige, self-censor and draw nonthreatening gag cartoons about swilling beers at the White House, we’re part of the problem and deserve our enforced dirt nap.
Life will go on without editorial cartoons, just as it will without bank regulation. The death of newspapers is not so different from the death of any other commodity: eight-track tapes, perhaps.
That is, if eight-track tapes were fundamental to a functioning democracy.
On a somewhat related note, here is a video of Canadian editorial cartoonist Bruce MacKinnon singing a song entitled “Better days” at this year’s AAEC convention in Seattle.
Hat tip to Rob Tornoe.
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