Wonder what the staff of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette thinks of the firing of cartoonist Rob Rogers, who refused to draw the pro-Trump propaganda demanded by the paper's newly-installed rightwing overseer?post-gazette.com/local/city/201…
Here's a remarkably frank article that is running in the P-G. This kind of thing is rare in media, covering your own in-house controversies. It's one of my top beefs with all the newspapers I've worked for, and the alt-weeklies were even more slippery than the big dailies.
The P-G, which is open revolt against ownership, breaks that norm. Kudos. All old rules are off now that we're deep in the End Times of the newspaper biz.
The main villain here is the paper's owner, Trump fanboy John Robinson Block. But his hatchetman now has a name, editorial director Keith Burris, a far-right rube from Toledo, where Block has turned the Blade into a Trumpite organ, too, headed by this same creep.
How grating must that be to Pittsburgh staffers? To have some clown brought in from a shitty paper like the Blade and run roughshod over people who have 50 times the resume and chops as this clown?
Burris' quotes here say it all. Under Block's orders he "has been trying “to right the ship” to reflect less liberal views" and Rogers was sacked because "Mr. Rogers was unwilling to “collaborate” with him about his work and ideas." RIGHT THERE is the crux of it!
Collaborate? Oh yeah, I'm sure what Burris had in mind was a "collaboration'!
Burris tells Rogers what to draw, flaunting 150 years of political cartoon history, and exploits Rogers' name and rep for his own lame ideas? Best of all, he gets to hide behind Rogers' name, which is on the cartoon, and make whatever fascist point he wants!
That's not how it works with political cartoons. That's not how it's EVER worked, in the 150-year history of the artform here. THat's akin to writing some faceless management goon writing a column, then slapping Maureen Dowd's name on it and claiming she wrote it!
What Burris wants is to order Rogers what to draw, flaunting 150 years of political cartoon history, and exploits Rogers' name and rep for his own lame ideas.
Meaning Burris thinks political cartoons aren't opinion, they're mere propaganda. This is what state media does in dictatorships!
Then he takes a cheap shot at Rogers for not being funny enough! Oh, yeah, I bet you're a laff riot, Keith old boy. Fuck this guy. He represents the absolute WORST in journalism. Ladder-climbing creeps who rise based on obedience, not talent.
The P-G staff is in near revolt against the rightwing owner anyways, after a jaw-dropping editorial, written by Burris, defending Trump's racism. IT ran on MLK Day, which is the sort of shit rightwing assholes like Block & Burris love to do!
The Pittsburgh staff wrote a group letter-to-the-editor savaging the piece, which, of course, BLock refused to run in the paper, so it was released online. LOcal backlash was a firestorm. pittsburghfoundation.org/shame
Keep in mind Pittsburgh is a bright blue stronghold. It went for Hillary by a whopping 75%! This is a Trump loyalist, his mouth full of little orange dick, trying to bludgeon a community with rightwing screeds in the hope of steering a city to the right.
It won't work, of course. With the avalanche of criticism and anger following Rogers' ouster, what will happen is a massive plummet in circulation. That wipes out all the good the P-G staff does, outside of the rightwing editorial page, but hard to say it isn't deserved.
Rob stuck to his principles, as befits a cartoonist with his resume and rep. I salute him.
Don't know what his options are now. Staff cartoonist jobs are damn rare. He's still distributed by a syndicate, but that's freelance with no healthcare or pension. Meanwhile Burris collects a fat, 6-figure paycheck. Right there is why papers are dead.
Chase off an exceptional talent and fill the staff with obedient toadies. That's the last 20 years of the newspaper biz RIGHT THERE.
I'm not the smartest guy, god knows, but I give myself a little pat on the back for bailing on the mainstream political cartoon biz all those years ago, because I saw shit like this coming down the pike. even as a clueless 25-year-old.
The editorial interference, especially as the newspaper biz petrified into monopoly markets with one paper. Used to be there was a competing daily to a Block-owned paper. I lived in Pittsburgh in 1978. I remember the Press.
Papers weren't so over-the-top politically back then, as they are in today's depressing tribalism. And cartoonists were still granted some freedom, although that was shrinking.
Fact is, editors post-1980 have always been terrified of political cartoons and their power. So they emasculated them by hiring only the lamest cartoonists, guys who provide only a chuckle-of-the-day, not savage cartoon commentary.
Editors like Buriss have done what all the Boss Tweeds and Richard Nixons failed to do. They killed political cartooning as a vibrant American art form. Give yourself a big pat on the back, asshole.
