An unlikely firestorm was ignited on the 19th of April, 1999. The
Universal Press Syndicate made the largest launch ever of a single
comic strip in the history of the printed page when it debuted an
off-beat work in more than 160 newspapers that day (and 40 more by
year's end). The strip, centering on two prepubescent Black youths
transplanted from the inner-city of South Chicago to the lily-white
fictional suburb of Woodcrest, immediately set off controversy with its
daily skewerings of race, politics, music and every other slice of
Americana considered taboo to the "funnies". And yet both the success
and controversy of the comic happened so fast that few knew about the
man behind it all. The strip is "The Boondocks", brainchild of Aaron McGruder.
Born in Chicaco, Illinois in 1974 under the sign of Gemini, Aaron and
his parents soon moved to from their largely-Black neighbourhood to a
mostly-white suburb in Baltimore, Maryland when Aaron was about to
start school. Spending the majority of his life there, young Aaron got
a first-hand education on race relations; often feeling like an
outsider as a minority. Yet, he was never unhappy. It was during his
productive and highly influential youth that McGruder would come in
contact with the things that would change his life forever. The first
was Krieg der Sterne (1977). After his first viewing of George Lucas' galaxy far, far away,
McGruder become one of many children his generation to have a life-long
obsession with the film (not unlike Jersey-borne filmmaker Kevin Smith).
The second was Hip-Hop. The uniquely African-American musical style
became to new generations what jazz and the British invasion had been
years before. As the civil rights movement ended and Reaganomics took
over, Hip-Hop became the only viable, uncensored outlet for Black youth
to express themselves unchallenged. The third was comics. Not just the
"funny books" containing the adventures of Superman and Spider-Man, but
comic strips. Aaron's tastes over the years ranged from the
funny-yet-true child's POV as shown by Charles M. Schulz with "Peanuts" to,
eventually, the irreverent humour of Berkeley Breathed and Bill Waterson "Bloom
County" and "Calvin & Hobbes" (respectively) to the biting political
satire of Garry Trudeau's "Doonesbury."
After graduating high school, McGruder enrolled in the University of
Maryland where the budding artist found his first widespread outlet for
his creativity. After fellow UofM student Frank Cho (author of the cult
comic "Liberty Meadows") graduated in the mid-90s, the school
newspaper, The DiamondBack, was left without a leading comic strip. The
paper's lead editor, Jayson Blair (who would later court his own
controversy with his infamous run at The New York Times), doubted that
anything would grab as much attention as Cho's work. Aaron gladly
volunteered for the job, creating a strip that would combine elements
of his own life with an all-around "Hip-Hop perspective" of world
events as told through the eyes of young Black children wise beyond
their years. With that, "The Boondocks" premiered in The Diamondback
and became an instant hit, introducing UofM students to Huey Freeman,
an afro-sporting, self-appointed revolutionary (named after Huey P.
Newton, co-founder of the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense); Riley
Freeman, Huey's unapologetic "gangsta"-wannabe younger brother; and
Jazmine DuBois, a bi-racial girl with little more control over her
racial identity than her own fussy hair.
With the help of fellow student and aspiring DJ, Rhome Anderson,
McGruder began showing the strip on the internet. The strip achieved
enough popularity to the point where in 1998 it received its first
national print publication in the pages of the Hip-Hop magazine "The
Source" for three months straight (details of why it was removed vary).
After graduating UofM with degrees in Afro-American studies, McGruder
and Anderson courted several offers to publish the strip in national
newspapers before finding an agreeable one with Universal Press
Syndicate. The strip made its national premiere April of 1999 with the
largest debut for a new comic in a record 160 papers nation-wide. The
strip immediately caused controversy. Everything from the characters'
(anime-influenced) designs to the handling of the bi-racial Jazmine
seemed to stir the ire of someone no matter where the strip was
published. Some Blacks claimed it was stereotypical and derogatory;
many whites claimed it was outright racist, hurtful and divisive.
Parents found such common strip activities like the boys being spanked
by their Grandfather and young Riley's bullying of other children
undeserving of print space alongside such veteran "G"-rated fare as
"Garfield" and "Peanuts". Even fellow UofM alum Frank Cho--whose strip
"Liberty Meadows" was taking heat for its blatant sexual content and
toilet humour--called McGruder's strip "racist and hateful."
Yet for all the angry resentment, the positive response to the strip
was equally-strong. In fact, many papers struggled with whether or not
to drop the strip because of strong following. Many fans celebrated its
genuine Hip-Hop references and championed it as a long-silent voice for
the Black community now having the opportunity to be heard. The
characters were championed for the way Aaron had the characters ask
questions from "Why are there no good Black TV shows?" to "Why is Black
History Month in the shortest month of the year?" McGruder himself
seemed to take it all in stride frequenting the late-night rounds on
such series as Politically Incorrect (1993), BET Tonight with Tavis Smiley (1998), and 20/20 (1978) among others.
Over the years, the strip's controversy and popularity have only
continued to grow. McGruder has had his characters speak on everything
from exploitative rap videos, the NRA, Black conservatives, and
inter-racial marriage to such trivial pursuits as lawn-mowing as a form
of illegal child labour and the surge of rappers as movie stars over
the past ten years. The strip is constantly a hot topic with several
paper often moving it out of the "comics" section to "Editorials" and
some removing it from the paper altogether. Recognizable personas from
BET founder Robert L. Johnson to conservative columnist Ward Connerlly have
publicly condemned the strip (and have often found themselves the
subjects of its jibes). Right-wing "avengers" often criticise the
strip's constant "attacks" on George W. Bush.
Nothing seemed to escape the wrath of the Freeman brothers, not even
McGruder's beloved "Star Wars". In the weeks leading up to the
highly-anticipated released of Star Wars: Episode I - Die dunkle Bedrohung (1999), Huey and Riley were shown
lining up in eager anticipation. After the film was released, the boys
expressed reactions felt by many life-long fans when they skewered the
movie and its supposedly racist character Jar-Jar Binks. Ironically,
the strip found one of its biggest fans in that film's co-star,
Samuel L. Jackson. In late 2001/early 2002, the strip found itself with more
controversy than usual (if that's at all possible) when, after the
attacks of 9/11, McGruder swayed away from mainstream opinions of the
country and had his characters criticise every thing from the
mainstream media's cheerleader-like support of war and Bush to the
false patriotism of flag-wavers in light of the attacks. The strip was
pulled from several major papers (particularly in New York). Rather
than back down from this position, McGruder satirized his "banning" by
pretending the strip was being replaced with mock characters in the
form of a US flag and ribbon. Many assumed that the strip has actually
been canceled and that the new "patriotic" comic was permanent,
unknowing that McGruder himself was proving his point all the more.
In the years since its introduction, the strip has gone through minor
changes: Rhome Anderson is no longer involved with the strip; several
new characters have been added; McGruder has compiled two books of
collected strips (with a third due late 2003); he's gotten the
opportunity to meet his influential heroes, including Garry Trudeau and he is
currently teaming up with filmmaker Reginald Hudlin in an attempt to get an
animated version of "The Boondocks" off the ground. Love him or hate
him, Aaron McGruder finds himself in that great pantheon of classic satirists:
his opinion may not be yours, but he has a basis from which he speaks
that makes his a voice worth listening to. Were his strip nothing more
than senseless rambling (something he himself has often joked about),
it wouldn't have nearly gotten the amount of attention it has. It is a
sharp perspective from someone whose generation is constantly said to
have none. You needn't agree, but you'd do best to give it a
listen.
