Editors Angry; Late Warning on 'Doonesbury' beheading Strip

Editors Angry About Late Warning on 'Doonesbury' Strip
By Edditors &Publishers Staff
Published: May 17, 2004

NEW YORK Some newspapers are fuming that Universal Press Syndicate's warning about a "beheading" image appearing in the May 23 edition of the "Doonesbury" comic strip arrived too late for them to remove or replace it.

As revealed Friday (Newspapers Warned About Upcoming 'Doonesbury' Strip), the notice from Universal, and offer to send a substitute strip -- in the wake of the beheading of American Nicholas Berg in Iraq last week -- came too late for the hundreds of papers that print their Sunday comics 10 days to two weeks in advance.

Among the major papers stuck with the strip: the Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, the Chicago Tribune, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and The Star-Ledger of Newark, N.J.

"We're going to have to publish it because we've already printed," Elizabeth McIntyre, the features editor for The Plain Dealer of Cleveland, told the Washington Post. "If I'd known on Wednesday, I could have done something about it." McIntyre may run a note to readers on May 23, explaining that the strip was drawn and printed before Berg's execution.

As E&P revealed on Friday, "Doonesbury" creator Garry Trudeau will release a statement on his Web site, www.doonesbury.com, on May 23, saying, "I regret the poor timing, and apologize to anyone who was offended by an image that is now clearly inappropriate."

Lee Salem, editor of Universal, said one client noticed the beheading strip in the pipeline last Thursday. "We probably should have made the connection, but we did not," Salem said.

"Every single day I'm saying yea or nay on some comic that's problematic, and that was never the case five years ago," Kyrie O'Connor, deputy managing editor of features for the Houston Chronicle told the Washington Post. O'Connor was among those who managed to pull the "Doonesbury" strip before it was too late.