Comic Arts and Letters to the Editor(s)

Another round of newspaper editors getting letters about the cartoons and comics they run.

We start with The Oregonian’s Editor and VP of Content Therese Bottomly’s “Letter from the Editor” recounting some of the letters received by the newspaper from people concerned about the comics on their funny pages and providing examples:

Last month, I fielded a complaint from a Milwaukie reader about “Wizard of Id,” which launched in 1964. The comic showed a building labeled Old Folks Home and it was described as “overflowing.”

“Thereupon, the Wizard searched out the Grim Reaper saying, “You need to get back to work,” the reader wrote. “The implication is that the way to deal with too many old folks is to eliminate them!”

and

Last year, another reader wrote in. “I was offended, consternated and disappointed by ‘The Duplex’ cartoon … showing a woman violently slapping someone in a bar,” the reader said. “Gratuitous violence is offensive and is not funny or entertaining!”

More recently:

A third reader wrote to me about the comic “Cornered.” The panel (above) depicted a man showing his phone to a person who appeared homeless. The caption said, “Maury Katz, founder of the funny cat videos outreach program.”

“Mr. Baldwin’s comic on page one of Sunday’s Online Extra section is in extremely poor taste,” the reader wrote. “Who would think mocking the situation of a homeless person is funny?”

Editor Therese contacted Cornered cartoonist Mike Baldwin for a response:

“What makes any cartoon or other art interesting and/or engaging is that the reader brings 50% to the experience,” the creator Mike Baldwin told me by email. “As the artist/cartoonist, I set up a situation that I find humorous and/or engaging, then I put it out there. I only get to control the the first half, which is creating the work; how it’s interpreted is pretty much out of my hands because it can often be interpreted different ways by different people.”

I will make a couple remarks about the informative column on how newspapers come about running their comics.

She starts with:

News organizations like The Oregonian/OregonLive pay thousands of dollars each year for the rights to publish various comics and comic strips, typically managed by syndicates that also offer puzzles and games.

I can remember when newspapers in The Oregonian’s bracket used to mention that they pay tens of thousands of dollars for their syndicated content, not just thousands of dollars.

And then there is this:

An important note: Because of the way syndication works, editors at The Oregonian do not see comics in advance. The pages are laid out and shipped well in advance of publication, and we rely on editors at the syndicates to catch and flag offensive material that violates usual standards.

Well, that settles it. Newspapers are completely absolved of any responsibility for syndicated material they choose to run even though they admit to having plenty of time to review the pages.

Read Therese Bottomly’s full opinion piece here.

Moving on…

…to a Gary Varvel editorial cartoon. A reader of The Missourian took exception:

The editorial cartoon which appeared in the Wed March 6 edition of The Missourian about “Christian Nationalists” is in error, in depicting Jefferson, Franklin, Madison and even Washington as traditional Christians. At least as described in their own words, most were Deists — they did believe in a Creator-God, but Jefferson, for one, went through drafts of the Declaration of Independence and removed all references to Jesus of Nazareth…

… Yes, some founders were Christians. But by no means are either the Declaration or the Constitution Christian documents.

A Portland Press Herald reader called a Dick Wright cartoon misleading:

The Feb. 22 political cartoon showed Biden completely underwater, helplessly trying to bail the U.S. out of the continuing southern border problem. It did not show what is going on: the continuing block of any progress to solve the problem by Republicans, who really want to put off border action to get their candidate elected.

Among the dozens of replies to that letter was one from an individual who thought it was good but that cartoonist Dick Wright followed it up with a better one:

Today’s Dick Wright cartoon about Biden and the student loan forgiveness is even better:

www.wctrib.com/opinion/cartoons/editorial-cartoon-for-feb-27-2024

Back to the funny pages. It’s bad enough that comics are printed so small, then putting the script in shadows?

From the Washington Post about a habit Wulff & Morgenthaler have with their WuMo comic:

I wish the daily comics page could be printed in color so I could see the dialogue in “WuMo.” On some days, I miss the punchline because it’s too hard to read black type on a dark background. Or maybe the text could be converted to white on gray.

Otherwise, I’ll have to find an address for creators Mikael Wulff and Anders Morgenthaler, so I can send them some clippings.