The Boston Herald and cartoonist Jerry Holbert have apologized for a political cartoon featuring President Obama that many on social media criticized as being racist.
The cartoon shows Obama brushing his teeth with a white man in the bathtub behind him asks, “Have you tried the new watermelon flavored toothpaste?” along with the caption “White House Invader Got Farther Than Originally Thought.”
“I want to apologize to anyone I offended who was
hurt by the cartoon,” Holbert said on Boston Herald Radio. “It was certainly, absolutely, not my intention.”
Holbert said he used the watermelon flavor because he saw “kids Colgate watermelon flavor” toothpaste in his bathroom at home, and he was not thinking about the stereotype that African-Americans love watermelon.
“I was completely naive or innocent to any racial connotations. I wasn’t thinking along those lines at all,” Holbert said.
Holbert’s national syndicate asked to change the watermelon reference.
“They said there’s a racial element to it, and I disagreed to be honest with you, but I did it anyway because that’s what they were asking for,”
Holbert said, according to CBS Boston.
Sue Roush, managing editor of gocomics.com, shared a slightly different version of the exchange, according to the station: “The editor suggested to Jerry that the use of watermelon as a toothpaste flavor could inject a racial subtext that would distract from the point of the cartoon. Jerry agreed and happily replaced it with raspberry.”
The Herald offered this apology: "As Jerry Holbert discussed on Boston Herald Radio this morning, his cartoon satirizing the U.S. Secret Service breach at the White House has offended some people and to them we apologize. His choice of imagery was absolutely not meant to be hurtful. We stand by Jerry, who is a veteran cartoonist with the utmost integrity."
Twitter users shared mixed reactions.
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