Dilbert creator Scott Adams broke the rule no one ever should: Don’t be racist | Opinion

As a fellow cartoonist, I’ve watched Scott Adams and the Dilbert comic strip for years. At his best, Adams hit the tech boom zeitgeist perfectly and was a brilliant writer who channeled his characters through his own life experiences.

He’s also walked the tightrope of extreme views, often stepping on his own tie by gushing over Donald Trump, mocking the pandemic and vaccines, and generally being transphobic and anti-gay. He’s espoused extreme views in his strip and his life. Then on a recent podcast, Adams said that Black people were a “hate group,” and that whites should “stay the hell away from them.”

The guy is as clueless as Dilbert.

As a cartoonist myself, I know how hard it is to do the job on a daily basis. I also drew a comic strip called Mixed Media, which launched around the same time as Dilbert. I understand the high pressure to create the ideas, do the drawings and not fall behind on deadlines.

What cartoonists think is amusing and clever may not be to a newspaper audience — and I have the letters from readers to prove it.

But here’s an easy rule we can all follow: Don’t be a racist.

When Jesse Jackson was running for president in 1984, the virtually all-white male editorial cartooning community seemed puzzled by how to portray him. I recall I did a cartoon about Jackson that some called racist. I didn’t think so, but I was also open to the conversation. I also knew I wasn’t Black.

The best conversation I had about the cartoon was with the Rev. Jesse Jackson, in person, when he visited my newsroom while I worked in Portland. He was gracious. He didn’t say I had to agree with him, told me what he thought, we had a great conversation and I was neither offended nor dismissive.

In Scott Adams’s case, I doubt he’d be interested in any form or manner of conversation with Jackson, but he should be.

Adams has exited newspaper journalism, which I think is deliberate, to move to a Patreon or Substack subscription system. By doing so, he’ll be able to say all the racist, whackjob stuff he wants. (There’s a market for it, too. Just ask Trump.)

Adams didn’t want to grow beyond his racist attitudes over his career. He wallowed in them and amplified them.

It’s a fitting, but very unfunny punchline to his final strip.

Scott Adams wasn’t canceled. He discovered the free market economy. And the market said racism is wrong.

This story was originally published March 4, 2023 at 5:00 AM.