Everything I need to know I learned in the Sunday Comics Recovering Liberal
Every once in a while, I open the paper to the letters to the editor section and read a complaint about the political nature of comic strips. The writer usually complains about strips like Doonesbury or The Boondocks, both of which posit a liberal point of view. Oddly, the never mention other strips such as Mallard Fillmore, State of the Union or The Wizard of Id, which take the opposite point of view. One need not invest a lot of thought into the notion that Liberals can often be defined by their willingness to have all points of view represented in open dialog while Conservative wish to hear only their point of view regardless of whether or not it contains a grain of truth.
Certainly, the politicization of the comics did not begin with any of the aforementioned strips. It actually began at the turn of the 19th Century into the 20th Century with the introduction of THE YELLOW KID by Richard Felton Outcault, somewhere around 1894.
Later, the comics were used to provide both political and racist messages. The original Katzenyammer Kids were drawn to provide a prejudiced view of Germans. Chester Gould, the creator of Dick Tracy used his strip to create racial descriptions of his villains that jumped off the pages of the comics into American slang. Terms like “Dago” for Italians and “Spic” for Hispanics entered the lexicon straight from the mouth of Dick Tracy and Sam Ketchum.
And so, I looked at the comics this past Sunday to see the place where the deepest political commentary of our society is originating political. Here’s what I found
I’ll begin with Bruce Tinsley’s generally conservative, Mallard Fillmore. I say generally conservative because, surprisingly, this week’s strip was more liberal than I would have imagined.
We open with Mallard displaying signs like “Freedom”, “Democracy” and “Human Rights”. He then explains that Microsoft has agreed to create software that will prevent Chinese users for communicating those words in their e-mails. Mallard then holds up the word, “Integrity”, explaining that this is a word the Microsoft apparently doesn’t understand.
We move on to another conservative strip, THE WIZARD OF ID” by Parker and Hart. The king is being introduced to his new polltaker who explains that he generally takes samplings of both smart and stupid people and then determines which result fit the clients’ needs. The king tells the pollster to lose the smart list. I found that one very interesting as it espouses a point of view which is probably fostered every time the Bush administration commissions a poll.
My point here is that the comics are often more telling than they might seem, and the fact that the two most conservative of these strips are taking positions that are more what you would expect from Democrats than Republicans may be an early indicator that even the middle and moderate right are now getting disgusted with the Bush Administration.
Tick, tick, tick! Is that the impeachment clock I am beginning to hear?
Wait, I’ll have to look in next Sunday’s comic section.
Oh. My. God. Shakespeare's Sister
I’ll begin with Bruce Tinsley’s generally conservative, Mallard Fillmore. I say generally conservative because, surprisingly, this week’s strip was more liberal than I would have imagined.
We open with Mallard displaying signs like “Freedom”, “Democracy” and “Human Rights”. He then explains that Microsoft has agreed to create software that will prevent Chinese users for communicating those words in their e-mails. Mallard then holds up the word, “Integrity”, explaining that this is a word the Microsoft apparently doesn’t understand.
We move on to another conservative strip, THE WIZARD OF ID” by Parker and Hart. The king is being introduced to his new polltaker who explains that he generally takes samplings of both smart and stupid people and then determines which result fit the clients’ needs. The king tells the pollster to lose the smart list. I found that one very interesting as it espouses a point of view which is probably fostered every time the Bush administration commissions a poll.
My point here is that the comics are often more telling than they might seem, and the fact that the two most conservative of these strips are taking positions that are more what you would expect from Democrats than Republicans may be an early indicator that even the middle and moderate right are now getting disgusted with the Bush Administration.
Tick, tick, tick! Is that the impeachment clock I am beginning to hear?
Wait, I’ll have to look in next Sunday’s comic section.
