Just when you think Thanksgiving couldn't get more interesting, one of the all-time classic holiday specials got called out for racism.
A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving holiday special has been a staple in many homes over the years. However, over the past few years, people have noticed the Black character, Franklin, sits alone, The Hill reports.
The majority of the characters — Sally, Charlie Brown, Peppermint Patty and Snoopy — sit on one side of a make-believe Thanksgiving dinner table.
Twitter took the popular Peanuts cartoon to task and dissected the problematic scene.
I want y'all to look at the setup of this table before and after they knew where Franklin wanted to sit. They treated him like you can "catch" Black #CharlieBrownThanksgiving
pic.twitter.com/1daaGDLtyT— Lamont Price (@LPizzle) November 22, 2018
Let’s talk about Franklin. Dude gets invited to Charlie Brown’s by Peppermint Patty. Then he finds out that it wasn’t a real invite, a dog is cooking the food and he’s gotta sit by himself at dinner. That’s Get Out. #CharlieBrownThanksgiving
— Terry Big Blue Brown™️ (@TBrown_80) November 22, 2018
This used to be a family tradition when I was a child. Now that I’m an adult and woke- I’ve thrown a middle finger to #CharlieBrownThanksgiving America has been giving us the #foldingchairtreatment for 400 years- I won’t tolerate it from my cartoons too. pic.twitter.com/9hoKeNth0C
— Sylvia K. Alston (Cousin Syl) (@SylviaKAlston) November 21, 2018
There is a rich history behind the lone Black character in the series. Peanuts creator Charles Schulz added the character to the cast after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
According to The Washington Post, he received a letter from a teacher named Harriet Glickman around 1968. From that point on, Franklin was a permanent cast member. This year marks the 50th anniversary of the character.
Journalist Jeremy Helligar defended the other specials featuring the character in a Medium post. "A relevant aside: During the farewell dinner about one hour and five minutes into 1972’s Snoopy Come Home, Franklin was seated on the same side of the table as Charlie Brown, Lucy and Frieda — in a regular chair," Helligar wrote.
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