More newspapers say they are dropping the “Dilbert” comic strip after creator Scott Adams this week advised white people to “get the f–k away” from Black people.
Gannett, the largest newspaper publisher in the US, has announced it will no longer run the workplace comic “effective immediately” over remarks Adams, 65, made on his online show “Real Coffee with Scott Adams.”
“Recent discriminatory comments by the creator, Scott Adams, have influenced our decision to discontinue publishing his comic. While we respect and encourage free speech, his views do not align with our editorial or business values as an organization,” the USA Today Network of hundreds of newspapers said in a statement Saturday to The Post.
“At Gannett, we lead with inclusion and strive to maintain a respectful and equitable environment for the diverse communities we serve nationwide.”
The Cleveland Plain Dealer also said it’s cutting ties with Adams following his “racist rant,” as well as the Washington Post. The news comes five months after Lee Enterprises cut the cartoon from its newspapers as it scaled back its funny pages.
“This is not a difficult decision,” Plain Dealer Editor Chris Quinn wrote Friday in his letter from the editor. “Adams said Black people are a hate group, citing a recent Rasmussen survey which, he said, shows nearly half of all Black people do not agree with the phrase ‘It’s okay to be white.'”
The Anti-Defamation League has noted that phrase was popularized on the website 4chan in 2017 for trolling purposes and adopted by white supremacists as a “hate slogan.”
The Post reached out to Adams and Quinn for comment.
The hourlong YouTube clip was posted Wednesday, racking up 119,000 views on Adams’ channel, which has 118,000 subscribers.
“I would say, based on the current way things are going, the best advice I would give to white people is to get the hell away from Black people,” he stated.
Adams also said it doesn’t “make any sense as a white citizen of America to try to help Black citizens anymore,” arguing that it is “no longer a rational impulse.”
“So I’m going to back off on being helpful to Black America because it doesn’t seem like it pays off,” he said.
Quinn, in the letter, claimed the paper’s move to sever ties with Adams wasn’t a “‘cancel culture’ decision,” but rather, “a decision based on the principles of this news organization and the community we serve.”
The Plain Dealer is part of Advance Local, which holds newspapers in Staten Island, New Jersey, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Oregon and Alabama. The chain belongs to the media company founded by the powerful Newhouse publishing family.
In his letter, Quinn said the leaders of those publications had also decided “independently” to cancel the comic strip.
The Washington Post, meanwhile, said Saturday it has ceased publication of “Dilbert” “in light of Scott Adams’s recent statements promoting segregation.”
Adams doubled down on his beliefs Saturday on Twitter, writing, “A lot of people are angry at me today but I haven’t yet heard anyone disagree.”
“I make two main points: 1. Treat everyone as an individual (no discrimination). 2. Avoid any group that doesn’t respect you,” the tweet continued. “Does anyone think that is bad advice?”
The comments rankled Twitter users, who called Adams a “racist” and argued he “canceled” himself.
Just last fall, “Dilbert” was stripped from around 80 newspapers owned by Lee Enterprises. Other comic strips were axed as well as part of the print revamp.
While Adams said he couldn’t prove it, he noted the termination occurred after he introduced “wokeness” into his office-centric cartoons.
“It was part of a larger overhaul, I believe, of comics, but why they decided what was in and what was out, that’s not known to anybody except them, I guess,” Adams told Fox News at the time.
The artist last year introduced a new character, Dave, who is Black, but identifies as white, which affects his employer’s diversity scores. Though publications fielded complaints from readers, Adams could not confirm that’s what led to his comic strip’s termination from print pages.
“What I do is I talk about how the employees handle the [diversity] situation. It’s not about the goal of it. But that’s enough to make people think that I must be taking sides politically,” he said at the time.
He admitted the cutbacks would be a “substantial” financial blow.
Since it was first published more than three decades ago, “Dilbert” has appeared in thousands of papers across the country and inspired merchandise and even a short-lived television series that aired from 1999 to 2000.
Adams claimed in 2020 the show was canceled due to him “being white.”
