Scholastic Books, the publisher of the popular “Captain Underpants” series, has pulled a book by the same author Dav Pilkey, for perpetuating passive racial stereotypes, USA Today reports.
Pilkey’s 2010 book, “The Adventures of Ook and Gluk,” was supposed to lead to a spinoff series for Captain Underpants readers. Pilkey used a gimmick of listing the two main characters from the Underpants series as the author and illustrator, using the book to clear up some “science facts” related to a story.
The author said he created the book to “showcase diversity, equality and non-violent conflict resolution” using “principles found in Chinese philosophy” but had recently been alerted that it “also contains harmful racial stereotypes and passively racist imagery.”
The author gave his full support to the publisher in pulling the book from distribution, saying that he never intended to offend anyone and wasn’t aware of the potential insult when he wrote it.
“I wanted to take this opportunity to publicly apologize for this,” he wrote Friday in a statement. “It was and is wrong and harmful to my Asian readers, friends and family, and to all Asian people. … I hope that you, my readers, will forgive me, and learn from my mistake that even unintentional and passive stereotypes and racism is harmful to everyone. I apologize, and I pledge to do better.”