Comics Censorship

I’m breaking out of my normal routine today to tell you about a blog post by one of my friends and syndicated cartoonist colleagues, Rina Piccolo. Rina draws a popular cartoon strip called “Tina’s Groove,” and, just like the rest of us whose main income comes from newspaper cartoons, is subject to the ludicrously (and I use that word literally) puritanical standards of newspaper comics. We’ve all had comics pulled from our lineup that wouldn’t even be called “edgy” in any other form of mainstream comedy because they could result in our features being cancelled in a given market. Rina describes the situation and reasons behind this phenomenon rather eloquently and it offers an interesting view into the behind-the-scenes workings of the syndicated comics world.

If you’ve ever wondered why webcomics are so funny and newspaper comics are so damned dull, read her short post.

Thanks, Rina, for articulating the kind of disappointment we’ve all felt about this.