Purdue University paper apologises for cartoon about tricking women into sex

NEW YORK - A Purdue University paper has apologised for printing a cartoon that jokes about tricking women into sex.

The three-panel cartoon, called “The Prestige”, shows a man having sex with a woman and then switching places with a second man without the woman’s knowledge. They then high-five each other as they swap.

“If properly executed, the receiving partner will be astonished as if a magic trick has just occurred. Tah-dah!” the New York Daily News quoted the caption on the cartoon as reading.

The cartoon has drawn outrage on the West Lafayette, Ind. campus, flooding the college newspaper email inbox with angry responses.

To many readers, the cartoon in question looked a lot less like boyish hijinks and a lot more like rape.

According to WLFI, a Facebook group as well as an online petition were started calling for action against the paper’s printing of the cartoon.

Purdue Exponent editor-in-chief Zoe Hayes admits in her open letter to the campus and to alumni and staff that when she took a second look at the cartoon, she saw that she had clearly missed something.

“If someone engages in any sexual act with anyone without his or her explicit consent, it’s rape. The comic can easily be interpreted that way,” she wrote.

Hayes also addressed those who took to Facebook and other social media sites to defend the paper’s right to print the cartoon, despite its distasteful subject matter.

“While we appreciate some of your arguments on our behalf, ladies and gentlemen, suggesting that someone was “asking for” rape is misguided and precisely the problem here,” she wrote. (ANI)