the creator of the boon docks

Aaron McGruder
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Aaron McGruder

Born May 29, 1974 (1974-05-29) (age 33)
Chicago, Illinois, United States
Occupation writer, artist, public speaker
Notable work(s) The Boondocks

Aaron McGruder (born May 29, 1974 in Chicago, Illinois) is an American cartoonist best known for writing and drawing The Boondocks, a Universal Press Syndicate comic strip about two young African American brothers from inner-city Chicago now living with their grandfather in a sedate suburb. Through the leftist Huey (named after Huey P. Newton) and his younger brother Riley, a young want-to-be gangsta, the strip explores issues involving African American culture and American politics.

When McGruder's father accepted a job with the National Transportation Safety Board, McGruder moved to Columbia, Maryland at age six with his parents and his older brother Dedric. He attended a Jesuit school from grades seven to nine, followed by public high school at Oakland Mills High School and the University of Maryland, from which he graduated with a degree in African American Studies. The Boondocks debuted in the campus newspaper, The Diamondback, in late 1997, under its then-editor, Jayson Blair. McGruder created the comic while working at the Presentation Graphics Lab on campus. At the time, he was also a DJ on the "Soul Controllers Mix Show" on WMUC.

McGruder currently lives in Los Angeles, California, where his projects include the Boondocks animated series and the Super Deluxe variety comedy series, The Super Rumble Mix Show. He is the author of five Boondocks collections: All The Rage, Public Enemy #2, A Right To Be Hostile, Fresh for '01: You Suckaz, and Boondocks: Because I Know You Don't Read The Newspaper. McGruder is also the co-author, with Reginald Hudlin, of a 2004 graphic novel, Birth of a Nation: A Comic Novel, drawn by cartoonist Kyle Baker, and a frequent public speaker on political and cultural issues.

[edit] Controversy

The content of McGruder's comic strip often came under fire for being politically left-wing and occasionally risque, leading to its being published in the op-ed section of many newspapers. For example, a strip making fun of BET's rap videos, some of which rely on lewd female gyrations, and a strip mocking Whitney Houston's drug problems were pulled out of circulation[citation needed] for emphasizing her buttocks and marijuana use, even though done as parody. McGruder has also received hate mail for his unflattering portrayal of white racism,[citation needed] and garnered significant attention after the September 11, 2001 attacks with a series of strips in which Huey calls a government tipline to report Ronald Reagan for funding terrorism. Soon after, he "censored" several strips by featuring a talking patriotic yellow ribbon and a flag instead of the usual cast.

Several of his strips have been briefly pulled from prominent publications. His "Condi Needs a Man" strip, in which Huey and his friend Caesar create a personal ad for U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, portraying her as a "female Darth Vader type that seeks loving mate to torture", resulted in The Washington Post withholding a week's worth of strips, the longest such suspension ever by the paper—whose ombudsman, Michael Getler, later sided with McGruder. [1] The Post also declined to run "Can a Nigga Get a Job?", which had black contestants compete on a reality TV show to work for Russell Simmons, only to find that all the contestants were rude and lazy. This unflattering portrayal drew the ire of many in the African American community.[citation needed]

Conservative Black commentator Larry Elder published an opinion piece in which he created the "McGruder Awards" as he considered it a suitable name for complacent liberals, naming liberal commentators and including five quotes from McGruder, to whom Elder awarded his fictional award. In response, McGruder wrote a strip where Huey and Caesar discuss the "Most Embarrassing Black Person of the Year Awards", which they dub the "Elder".

McGruder also amassed controversy following his visit with Fidel Castro in Cuba, after being requested by California Congresswoman Barbara Lee to make the trip.[2]