Newsday and the New York Daily News might think so. Since September 11, both publications have chosen not to run selected Boondocks strips that dealt with the tragedy.

"There's a certain kind of heavy-duty political commentary that doesn't really belong in the funny pages,” said Daily News editor in chief Edward Kosner.

Clearly, newspaper editors have the right to run whatever comic strips they desire. But the dismissive attitude toward comics implied by the quote above sure does get my hackles up...

Boondocks artist Aaron McGruder appears to take exception to that kind of thinking as well.

"I feel America started moving very quickly in a dangerous direction with the drumbeating and warmongering,” McGruder said. "‘They're evil and we're not' -- that's such a fifth-grade way of looking at conflict. It is the responsibility of any thinking individual with a voice to say whatever they can say within their medium. You can't underestimate the power of one voice.”

The complete Newsday article can be found here: Drawing on the Headlines.

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"The Boondocks", like "Doonesbury" before it, is very good at depicting slices of life which point out absurdities, sometimes in a very biting way. Some readers may not have wanted to see such satire in the immediate aftermath of Sept 11, but overall, the attitude driving such commentary is (in my opinion) the essence of what freedom of expression is all about. Far more "American" than the Cirinist impulse to supress any expression that someone might find uncomfortable.

Today's strip is a good piece of meta-commentary on the issue. This is from memory, but Huey mentions that GW Bush wants us to get back to normal. "And what do I normally do?" he asks.

"Criticize Bush," answers his friend.

"So," remarks Huey, "NOT criticizing Bush would be letting the terrorists win." [img]/resources/ubb/smile.gif[/img]

- Larry H

YOu look like a terriost!! Batman!

FAIR has also covered this story (see http://www.fair.org/views.html ). The strip that apparently was the first one spiked can be found at http://www.ucomics.com/boondocks/viewbo.cfm?uc_fn=1&uc_full_date=20011004&uc_daction=X&uc_comic=bo . From that link you can read the subsequent strips.

- Elayne