A large group of protestors rallied in front of The Daily Texan office this afternoon to protest the editorial cartoon ran in Tuesday’s paper featuring the media in the Trayvon Martin case.

The collection of current and former students, faculty members and citizens demanded an apology for running the cartoon, asked for the newspaper’s editorial page to be opened up to minority voices on campus, and demanded the newspaper stop printing the drawings of Stephanie Eisner, the cartoon artist.

Earlier this week, The Daily Texan ran Eisner's cartoon about the role of media in the Trayvon Martin case on the editorial page of the newspaper. The cartoon featured a woman sitting in a chair representing the media, a book in her hands read, "Treyvon Martin and the Case of Yellow Journalism." The woman was pictured reading to a small child and saying, "And then...the BIG BAD WHITE man killed the handsome, sweet, innocent COLORED boy!!" The name of Trayvon Martin was misspelled as "Treyvon."

The managing editor of The Daily Texan, and eventually four members of the editorial board, met with the group to respond to the protestors’ questions and demands.


Video by Natasha Verma

“As of now there are no plans to fire or suspend Stephanie,” said Audrey White, the managing editor. “We have made huge mistakes before, I’m not going to speak as to whether I think this is one of them, but if we had to fire every person that screwed up we wouldn’t have a staff.”

Eisner did not attend the rally, and many protestors were angered that she did not come. The cartoon artist did release a statement to gawker.com today, though, apologizing for the drawing. The statement was released after The Daily Texan won the “Most Racist Trayvon Martin Cartoon” contest.

The group of protestors also called for the resignation of the five members of the editorial board, each of who reviewed the cartoon before it was published. Along with one copy editor and Eisner herself, at least seven people saw the cartoon and approved it before it ran in Tuesday’s paper, White said.


Editorial board members, left to river, Matt Daley, Shabab Siddiqui, Viviana Aldous, and Samantha Katsounas

“My understanding from conversations with the [editorial] board is that because they are familiar with Stephanie’s work, they simply did not read the cartoon in the way that so many people have,” White said.

Michael Bowman, a former comics artist and former associate comics editor at the Daily Texan from 2008 to 2010 was incredibly frustrated that this comic was not run past the comics editor, who has experience reviewing content. Bowman felt that even though the editorial board works independently from the rest of the newspaper, refusing to run the drawing past the comics section shows a complete lack of respect for the department.

“Stephanie may be an illustrator employed by the Texan, but an illustrator employed by the Texan needs to be going through some sort of dedicated comics artist who actually looks at each individual illustration,” Bowman said. “You have that department and you don’t utilize it, and that is ridiculous.”

The Daily Texan Editorial Board is composed of editor-in-chief Viviana Aldous and associate editors Matt Daley, Susannah Jacob, Samantha Katsounas and Shabab Siddiqui. All members but Susannah Jacob were at the rally to respond to questions. Jacob was recently voted the next editor-in-chief of The Daily Texan in the student government elections held at the beginning of this month.

Angry protestors stated that The Daily Texan is supposed to train students journalists to work at a professional publication, and in a real world situation, these editors would be fired. When the members of the editorial board were asked if they felt they should resign, none of them responded to the question.

“You think everyone would just keep their jobs and we’ll just take some sensitivity training and be good to go?” one protestor questioned the board. “If you want to accept some responsibility, you guys can resign.”

Many of the protestors felt that if the members of the editorial board could not see the racism in this cartoon before they approved it, the members should not be allowed to continue with their positions. “Why is ignorant racism on the staff?” one man asked. “Can we get ignorant racists off of the editorial board?” another called out.

“You shouldn’t be in your position, then,” One protestor said. “If you can’t understand the implications of racism that you can’t even perceive, then get out of your position and give it to somebody that does.”

White was the first member of The Daily Texan staff to approach the protestors and ask to respond to their comments and questions. She initially said she could not offer an apology on behalf of newspaper because she cannot speak as their voice and is not a part of the editorial board. Once four members of the editorial board arrived and apologized, however, she continued to apologize for The Daily Texan’s decision. Both White and Aldous told protestors they could expect an apology from The Daily Texan in tomorrow’s paper.

“I’ve worked here for three years, I’ve seen really good work done that I believe truly represents the diverse and incredible student body on this campus, and unfortunately I’ve seen cases where we’ve dropped the ball, and I understand that everyone here believes this is one of those times,” White said.

This frustrated members of the audience, though, who felt White was taking the blame for something she ultimately did not have a say in since her position does not approve editorial content. Their frustration was directed at the four members of the editorial board that were present, who also offered their apologies and explanations as to why they ran the cartoon.

The rally ultimately turned into a tense discussion over what the campus newspaper can do to improve racial attitudes in its newsroom. Protestors argued that minority opinions are consistently left out of The Daily Texan, and an incident such as this proves that there is racial insensitivity among the staff. Some protestors threw out ideas that the members of the newspaper should attend a training workshop or receive special education during their orientation in order to know how to report on these types of issues.

One protestor asked the members of the editorial board if they had ever taken any ethnic classes, but the members could not name any. White apologized for making students feel as if they have been misrepresented on campus, and says they need to hold a discussion to determine how The Daily Texan can represent all students.

Aside from asking for a printed apology and for Eisner’s work to be discontinued, the protestors asked for the newspaper’s editorial page to be opened up to minority voices on campus, such as the John L. Warfield Center for African American Studies so that students and professors can submit their own editorials.

“We’re open to running guest columns from people who want to write to us. I can guarantee you we’ll run a well-written column,” said Viviana Aldous , the editor-in-chief of the paper.

Lucian Villaseñor, a Mexican American Studies student, took offense to Aldous’ statement, though. “It was really insulting what she said. You’re kind of saying that these African American students and black students cannot write editorials,” he said. “Why didn’t you just say submit an editorial that meets the requirements and we’ll publish it? The way to respond to that was another example of another insensitivity that this board has.”

Villaseñor is one of the members of the protest encouraging students to organize against racist issues that are present on campus. He attended the Trayvon march to City Hall yesterday, where he asked the crowd to come to today’s rally to talk about these issues on campus.

“There’s dialogue happening, and that’s good,” he said.

After their discussion with the editors, the majority of the protestors still felt that the members of the editorial board should resign. Protestor Erica Puckett, along with the support of others, decided to write a petition for the resignation of the editorial board and gather signatures, which will be presented to the Texas Student Media Board.

“The more signatures we can get, the more they’ll take us seriously and know that we’re pissed off,” said Puckett. “Like it was pointed out, if this was in the real world, people would be losing their jobs right now. Thanks for the apology, but it’s too late. You don’t get a second chance.”