Roswell Daily Record editorial cartoonist Keith Bell is taking some heat from citizens who felt like his latest cartoon was telling blacks to go to Georgia and Hispanics to go to California.
Bell says he never meant to upset anyone. He says the picture is about people in Roswell working to change street names to honor public figures, not about telling certain people to get out of town.
He says MLK and Cesar Chavez are some of the street names the city is tossing around.
?If they had proposed a George W. Bush street, a street being named after him, I would have done the same cartoon,? Bell said. ?It just so happened the two figures that were mentioned were icons of certain communities.?
Hmmmm. Sorry, not buying it. At best this is a poorly executed cartoon, at worst a blatant declaration to minorities to leave town – or people supporting a MLK Jr. or Chavez street. KRQE reports there’s a petition to encourage readers and businesses to boycott the paper with 750 signatures so far.
That caption, “To clear up any confusion about where some people should go,” puts the lie to Bell’s claim that he’s not telling certain people to get out of town.
But if they do feel a need to get out of town, they can take Washington Ave. South to Tilden Street, then turn right on Pennsylvania to Van Buren or Stanton Avenue ….
Lesson for today: If you’re unwilling to defend your cartoon, don’t draw it.
Wow. I need to read more than just the headline next time. At first, I thought Alan meant Sandra Lundy Bell. Say it isn’t so!