C’mon. It’s just a comic strip.
That’ll be the response of the folks on the left after “Mallard Fillmore,” a comic strip that depicts a politically conservative duck who works as a reporter at a television station in Washington, D.C., was dropped from Gannett newspapers across the country after two cartoons that were vaguely critical of President Joe Biden and his encouragement of transgender participation in women’s sports.
If the media corporation ordered the particular strips not to be used, that would be taking a stance. If it also removed left-leaning “Doonesbury” from its pages – the route the Knoxville News Sentinel took in 2015 – that would indicate it wanted politics out of its comic strips. Dropping only “Mallard Fillmore” from a group of newspapers is a blatant attempt to silence a conservative voice, no matter how much political relevance one might give to a comic strip.
The Jackson (Mississippi) Clarion-Ledger told its readers about the move this way: “Effective today, we’re making a change to our comics line-up to replace the ‘Mallard Fillmore’ comic strip. We’re continually reviewing the comics we provide.”
It didn’t say why, and it didn’t note the directive came from its parent company.