29 June 2020

A second glance at the Modesty Blaise cartoon in today’s West Australian newspaper beggars belief that in 2020, offensive content like this is still surfacing.  With its beginnings in the early 1960’s this cartoon should be banished never to resurface in print again.

Dennis Eggington, CEO of the Aboriginal Legal Service of WA Ltd (ALSWA) said he was in utter disbelief that the cartoon was still being published, in spite of its offensive and racist overtones.

“I cannot believe my eyes!  Here you have a cartoon from decades ago that is racist and promotes negatives stereotypes.  ALSWA works tirelessly to fight against discrimination and I can assure you that this is not a joke and it is totally unacceptable” said Mr. Eggington.

“This is not a case of ‘political correctness gone mad’.  This is highly offensive and will not be tolerated by any fair-minded West Australian.  Any publicity that this attracts will be for all the wrong reasons and one would have hoped that the current worldwide ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement would have had an impact upon published material in this state” said Mr. Eggington.

Due to its offensive nature, ALSWA has decided not to show the cartoon, which was published in the West Australian Today section on page 6 on 29 June 2020.