Cartoon Controversy

It has been one of the most talked about controversies on campus for as long as I can remember. Forget the on again, off again campus wide elections that caused a stir the past couple of weeks…they don’t have anything on The Daily Texan’s latest published issue.

Tuesday’s issue, which featured a political cartoon of the Trayvon Martin case, has sparked quite the deserved debate across campus and The Daily Texan has been feeling the repercussions ever since. The cartoon has been scrutinized for picturing a judge calling Martin a “colored boy.” The cartoon artist Stephanie Eisner claimed that she was interpreting it as a “critique of media coverage surrounding the case, not racist.” After apologizing, she was fired from the Daily Texan board and has not released any further statements.

The editing board of the magazine all okayed the cartoon for publishing and never called the attention of their advisor to get a second opinion before publishing. I think the board, as well as other journalism students, learned a valuable lesson this week that although views of racism have changed, people are still as sensitive today as in the past and for a valid reason. While I think that the cartoon was a terrible representation of The University of Texas, the student run newspaper is a learning experience and the cartoon artist should not have been fired for her actions but instead taught the importance of representing all of the students at the university.