Dilbert cartoon dropped by several newspapers after racist rant by creator Scott Adams

That cartoon Dilbert has been removed from several US newspapers in response to racist remarks by its creator on YouTube.

Scott Adams called Black Americans a “hate group” and suggested white Americans “get rid of black people” in response to a poll by a conservative organization showing that many African Americans don’t mind being white.

“If almost half of all black people are not OK with white people … that’s a hate group,” Adams said on his YouTube channel on Wednesday. “And I don’t want anything to do with them.”

The comment caused an uproar on social media, with calls for the cartoonist’s work to be removed from the publisher’s list.

The Globe and Mail said Sunday it would no longer carry the comic.

“While we respect and encourage free speech, their views do not align with our editorial values ​​or our business as an organization,” the newspaper said in a statement posted to Twitter.

The once popular comic strip, which undermined corporate culture and was launched in 1989, will no longer be carried in the US by the Los Angeles Times, the Washington Post, a group of newspapers affiliated with USA Today and others, the newspaper announced in statements on Friday and abide.

“This was not a difficult decision,” Chris Quinn, editor of the Plain Dealer in Cleveland, said in a letter to readers sent Friday. “We are not a home for people who support racism.”

Individual cartoons were removed earlier

The Los Angeles Times on Friday also said it would drop the line.

“Cartoonist Scott Adams made racist comments on a YouTube live broadcast on February 22, making offensive remarks that The Times denies,” the paper said on its website.

The Times said it had removed four Dilbert cartoons from one page in the new month because they violate newspaper standards.

The New York Times said the comic only appeared in international print editions. Spokeswoman Danielle Rhoades Ha said it would no longer be published in the paper following the cartoonist’s comments.

Adams could not immediately be reached for comment by Reuters on Saturday. But on his YouTube channel, he confirmed that his comic was removed and said that he expected that to happen.

‘You can’t come back from this’

“By Monday, I should have most of the cancellations. So most of my income will be gone next week,” he said. “My reputation for the rest of my life is ruined. You can’t come back from this.”

Adams’ initial comments came in response to a conservative Rasmussen Poll showing that 26 percent of Black respondents said they disagreed with the statement “It’s okay to be white.” Another 21 percent said they weren’t sure.

However, Rasmussen also said an online and phone survey last week of 1,000 likely U.S. voters showed that 72 percent of Americans overall agree that it’s not white, compared to 12 percent who disagree.

Twitter CEO Elon Musk defended Adams in a post on the platform, saying the media was previously “racist against non-whites, now racist against whites & Asians.”

Adams said on Wednesday’s rant that he had moved to a different location to get away from black people, and urged other whites to do the same.

“I’m not saying start a war or anything,” he said. “I just said go.”