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‘Doonesbury’ moves to Op-Ed page this week

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The Times has moved this week’s “Doonesbury” comic strip to the Op-Ed page, and “Doonesbury” reruns will run in the strip’s place on the Comics page.

Editors were concerned about this week’s story line, which takes on a Texas law requiring women seeking an abortion to first undergo an ultrasound.

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In one panel, artist Garry Trudeau depicts a young woman being confronted by a “middle-aged male state legislator” who asks her, “Do your parents know you’re a slut?”

In another, in which the woman is about to undergo the required transvaginal ultrasound, the doctor describes the ultrasound probe as a “10-inch shaming wand” and refers to the procedure as a rape.

“We felt the story line was a little over the top for a comics page,” Times Assistant Managing Editor Alice Short said.

According to the Associated Press, several other newspapers, including the Kansas City Star, and the Gainesville Sun and Ocala Banner in Florida, also opted to run replacement strips. The Pocono Record in Pennsylvania told AP that it would move the strips to the op-ed page for the week.

The company that syndicates ‘Doonesbury,’ Universal UClick, expected as many as 20 to 30 of the 1,440 newspapers that run ‘Doonesbury’ to opt out, AP reported.

--Deirdre Edgar

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