Cruel World Commentary

The questions are being asked in the news is September 11 just another day.  To some people it probably is, to me it is not.  That is the simple answer, no one will feel the same about anything at any given time.  I am still angry that people were murdered because they went to work or boarded an airplane.  The cartoon that is featured is a by-product of September 11, cultural intolerance.  Several years ago cartoons were published in Denmark that featured Mohammed.  Images of Mohammed are not done in Muslim culture as opposed to cartoon culture where anything is fair game.  Of course a natural consequence of this cultural conflict turned into Muslim rioting, threats and the murder of a nun.  Denmark which has not done anything to aggravate the world since the Vikings was now in a fight with Islam over a cartoon.  The cartoon we are featuring came as an idea during the winter Olympics.  A smiling Dane taking out a rather worse for wear Muslim in a game of hockey.  The cartoon is several years late and I apologize for that, however I did not have a venue to feature my support of the Danes other than discovering how good Danish Cheese and Amstel Light tasted.  Other than that my sole support of the country was from earlier years of buying Legos for my son.  It’s September 11, take a few minutes to remember who we are and why we should be able to go to work or get on an airplane without worry and why we should be able to choose the cartoons we want to read without fear.

Contemplating a cartoon of Mohammed

Jordan

Another one of those polls came out with a sweeping statement condemningAmerican behavior.  Only 57% of the adults polled read a book in 2002.  Why did it take five years for this data to be released, maybe because we are worse at statistics than decoding.  I wonder about who they polled because I think that is a high percentage.  Mainly because people will lie when asked questions, it wouldn’t sound good to say that I read nothing more challenging than the drive through menu of that rotten restaurant controlled by a clown, so I’ll say I read one book, that way the nice pollster will think well of me.  Who was polled?  Was it by phone and limited to those people who have phones, or something as archaic as a land line, that implies home ownership, bill payments, steady income. Was it done outside a nice suburban mall, probably a better cross section of American citizens, however still limited to those who have the means to transport themselves to one of those distant locations and actually consume goods that are not needed.  Either way the results are probably greatly over estimated.  I could look it up but it is just easier to make sweeping generalizations based on some numbers followed by a percent sign.  Actually 37.5% of all statistics are made up on the spot.  The survey did remind me that I am drifting to the book a year club.  I have been working on a trashy mystery for months now, and making little head way.  I’ts not that all my free time is spent drawing comics either, I just checked and found the House comic has run and I’ve got to produce for Tuesday or Russell will drive by and shoot out my porch light. 

Vowing to finish that Ed McBain book this weekend.

Jordan

I said I might go into some more detail about the Bot Con Convention that my son attended in Rhode Island and instead I drew a comic that came to me while I was walking around in the exhibition hall looking at the toys and the adults.   I am not a big Transformer fan.   I was busy pursuing other interests in the 1980s vaguely knew that there were such a thing as Transformers as well as a myriad of other toys that were being marketed through 30 minute infomercials passing as cartoons.  Then I had a son and he was introduced to the toy years after the main run was over and the original transforming transformers were replaced with small poorly made non transforming robots.  My job was to put the microscopic stickers on the toy, (they never came with the stickers attached then) and help him put the toy through it’s paces.  I also cruised yard sales looking for the old toys and one time bought an entire collection off a kid.  He probably laments that decision to this day.   After my son mastered stickers and transforming everything I stepped aside and he has been a fan of the toy ever since.  I wish I had that kind of single mindedness and could have one thing that I enjoyed, but I have always been pulled in too many directions.  I appreciate his obsession, it is much safer and less offensive than many things he could be interested in.  At the convention he has made many friends and has had contact with the writers and artists that keep the franchise alive.  I met some very nice people at the convention and any similarity of the catrtoon to actual persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.

Still haven’t seen the movie…

Jordan 

Travel does broaden one, with me only around the waist.  Russell has been holding down the fort against the 13 or so marauding viewers and I have been out of touch off and on for the past week or so.  Once the trip is under way I am fine, until that point I am thinking of reasons not to leave my house.  If it was not for nonrefundable plane tickets I may have spent the weekend enjoying my video recorder and catching up on Sandra Lee cooking shows, sans advertisements.  Instead I flew to a place I never thought I would visit, Rhode Island, America’s version of Monte Carlo, (size analogy only).  The reason for the unlikely trip was to accompany my son and nephew on a visit to Bot Con, the convention for Transformer fans.  I will not go into the background of this situation other than I have not touched one of those toys after my son became able to put the microscopic stickers on them.  The kids had a ball, my son attended the preview of the new movie.  I may write about Bot Con later, it is too weird not to touch on.  I was able to find that Rhode Island, specifically the city of Providence is a very nice place.  The first few times I heard that northern accent the hair on the back of my neck would stand up, eventually this fight or flight response satiate and I was able to meet some very nice people, even though most of the men had one eyebrow and were wearing the mandatory Red Sox or Patriots shirt.  Apparently they don’t have TBS and have not been issued the mandatory Braves shirts as we have here in the hot south, (no one could ever make Falcons shirts mandatory).  I think their pleasant behavior was due to the wonderful weather they have, low to mid seventies.  Maybe that famous yankee behavior comes out when they are exposed to our sweltering temperatures…  The food there was another surprise, the south is a poorer place for not having a large Italian population.  That is why we are easily swayed by the canned corporate food slopped by Olive Garden.  If we ever had any readers some one would be mad by now, but I do want to state that the trip was very nice because of the people I met and the nice location.   Will I go back?  Only if forced out of my chair, and that will probably happen soon enough.

At home, sweaty and uncomfortable, but home.

Jordan

No blog, just liked the title.

Jordan

I wish I could take credit for finding the site I’m going to point out momentarily, but I can’t. I found it on James Lileks’ “Bleat” page this morning and I’m glad to see there are other people troubled by useless strangeness the same way I am.

There’s a series of commercials put out by BP that are just downright weird, not in the annoyingly pointless way the Shell commercials are with the smarmy Euro-engineer and his sneering little ingrate kid, but in some hazy Lego-meets-the-Beatles-and-I-traded-the-bong-for-a-whiff-of-93-octane kind of weird.

You know you’ve seen it, there are these little cartoon people which I have since learned are called the “Beeps” that dance around in EuroGas land and then push brooms around the inside of your engine. I’m not wild about breaking science down to that level but the BP people are the ones paying for the marketing, not me. I’d prefer to hear how their gas is cleaner and keeps the carbon off my valves rather than seeing a little guy in a county lockup jumpsuit dancing and singing on my carburetor. Whenever I see condescending commercials like that I always think of the explanation of the Cerebral Communicator by Pat Harrington in “The President’s Analyst”.

I know, I haven’t given up the website address yet, just stick around, the payoff is coming.

I will be the last person to ever suggest to any business or person on how to spend their money, but since I’m going to do just that, here goes; why not advertise in such a way as to defend your position as the hated entity that gas companies have become?

What say instead of the Beeps singing and brooming, they explain to the driving rabble that when adjusted for inflation, gasoline doesn’t cost much more than it did in 1980? Or for that matter point out that the very people in Washington wanting to investigate the “obscene profits” of the oil companies actually make something like 5 times that amount on every gallon?

I do realize that oil company hatred is something akin to religion and no matter what argument I put up will be met with derision, but isn’t that what advertising is all about? Sell me on your point of view, and if you are getting some bad press buy some air time and tell me how it really is.

It’s not a difficult concept.

How about this, rather than a series of spots about the aforementioned Euroengineer looking for better ways to drill for oil, start a series showing what the world would be like without the oil companies altogether. Just who would go out and discover the oil resources, poke the hole in the ground, pump out the crude, ship it to the refinery, turn it into gasoline, take it to the nice clean gas stations that are on every corner, and only make a margin of less than 10%?

Or at least get commercials that make me think gas station, like “We are the men of Texaco, we’re here from Maine to Mexico”, “You can trust your car to the man who wears the star”, or “Gulf premium knocks out the knocks!”.

Even Jack Benny used to drive his Maxwell into the Gulf station in those old spots, and if anyone was ever looking for a bargain on gas….

Enough of that, go here to be freaked out: See the Beeps.

Friday Update (June 8th) to CruelWorldComics.com!! Return of the Tiki Gods

Driving all over to find the cheapest gas,
Russell

Another May 15 has come and gone generating tons of email pollution in the form of Don’t Buy Gas Day notices.  I put the email  to the Snopes test to see how bogus it actually was.  Pleasego to snopes.com for a great source of urban legends and to find out if there is any validity to that free Applebees email cupon you recieved, before you share the wealth with everyone on your mailing list.  Anyone who could do simple math, which I can not, would know that if no one bought gas on a specific day then that would increase purchases immediately before or after having no effect on the gasoline producers or the prices they charge.  Driving behavior would have to change to effect the price of gas.  The email made absolutely no mention of doing something different on May 15 like staying at home and reading a book.  I would never advocate that Americans should do anything drastic like walk, we save that for tread mills.  I will however, advocate driving the speed limit, a measure probably as distastefulas walking but it would lessen consumption and lessen demand which would increase supply and lower prices.  We live in a market economy, get use to it the price is high because demand is high and the supply is low.  There is no gas crisis until we find there is no gas at any price.  If everyone left home 10 minutes early one day a year and drove the speed limit then we would see an effect, not so much on gas, but fewer accidents on the highway, less tension and anger as well.   That slow Prius that was in front of you the other day was probably me, so no more obscene gestures please.

I also recycle, but mostly ideas for cartoons.

Jordan

The astute visitor to Cruel World Comics will notice that the last cartoon was posted in full color. It’s something we have been tinkering a bit with over the last month and have now decided to bring to every panel.

Not only does the color make the images jump off the page, it helps to cover any challenges of talent that we may have.

 Anyway, we hope you enjoy the new colors, they are costing us a fortune in Technicolor royalties. Stay tuned, there are some painfully cruel cartoons ahead.

 Your colorized servants,

Russell and Jordan

Apparently Russell has not been reading the Blog or else he would have blocked me from posting a long time ago.  Reflecting on my last stream of altered consciousness posting I neglected to tie in my oblivion of the weather effecting the east coast with my vow to cease watching the infotainment passing for news.  This began when a self absorbed person that was in the news had a baby and immediately killed her self self medicating.  When that blew over and the citizens of the new Roman empire were bored the infotainment industry allowed a murdering mutant to have world wide coverage of his final rant.  The talking heads pontificated that they would not show the whole rant and that we could learn from the tragedy.  The mutants in training would learn much from the rant and will sadly repeat the actions in the future citing him has their source of inspiration.  No one in the media has the cajones to say, “Enough, we will not say the name of the mutant nor will we give him a voice.”  Thus I give a late commentary long after the citizens have moved on to another circus for their amusement. 

I will also give a late salute to Johnny Hart and Brant Parker co-creators of the Wizard of Id who died within days of each other.  Russell and I are taking bets on who will go first.  Either way we will probably die within minutes of each other from a murder suicide over artistic differences.  I hope no one pays attention to the video rant that one of us will leave.

Keeping a close eye on Russell,

Jordan

Sometimes the real world can be more cruel than the cartoon world. That thought struck me as I was composing checks to various tax agencies, part of my “investment” in this great land of ours.

I’m sure I’m not alone. Many folks will be lined up at post offices around the country tonight trying to get their paperwork in before the deadline. News stations will no doubt lead off with stories from the PO line and will have correspondents on the scene much like the Weather channel has on the beach during hurricane season.

Never understood that one though, what’s the point of sending someone down to the coast to see the wind blow? If the reporter were tethered to a cord and flying 10 feet off the ground, now that would be news. Otherwise they might as well report from inside the local Denny’s and say; “Hooowee! It sure is raining out there!!”

In other Cruel News, the updates have bogged down a bit, and not because of the planagement (stole that word from the local paper’s call in section. Click here to read that one), in fact we had a good session with tasty marts and such.

No, there have been other things, taxes, guests, work, and car trouble. None of which is an excuse, my problems aren’t your problems, but it still happened. Now that the dust has settled a bit there can be more focus on the cartoons, and that’s really what it is all about!

So keep coming back, and be sure to register to get updates, and we will have new stuff coming soon. Lots of new stuff!!

 To fun and games ahead,

Russell