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I've preferred his series where the mom is out protesting government health care. Much as I dislike Baucus's bill, I do think Trudeau makes some great points.
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Just read that this morning before church... interestingly, my paper cut out the first two panels, so I didn't quite get it until now. It's got me paranoid now. How many comics am I only reading in their partial form?
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Most Sunday comics are designed so that "extra" panels can get removed. I'd guess that for most Sunday comics, you're not seeing the full, original strip.
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I usually skip over Doonesbury. Me and Trudeau are are on different sides of the fence politically so his one-sided conservative-bashing usually does not amuse me. But for whatever reason I actually did read the comic yesterday and enjoyed it greatly. Extremists on both sides could use a little more perspective like this.
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quote:Originally posted by plaid: Most Sunday comics are designed so that "extra" panels can get removed. I'd guess that for most Sunday comics, you're not seeing the full, original strip.
Yep, depends on the syndicate and their deal with the cartoonist, as well as the paper. Bill Waterson wrote quite a bit about this practice, and even went so far as to demand (and accomplish) a deal with his syndicate that guaranteed his sunday comics would be printed in complete form in a format of his choosing, basically giving him the space of a rectangle in which to draw his sunday strips. He lost a number of papers when he made the switch. If you look at stuff from the later years of his run, he essentially abandoned panel based sunday strips in favor of floating boxes or flowing animation. He had the power to do that, but a lot of strip writers are stuck in a defined set of panels which can be cut by the papers and even rearranged or otherwise edited for length.
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quote:Originally posted by daventor: I usually skip over Doonesbury. Me and Trudeau are are on different sides of the fence politically so his one-sided conservative-bashing usually does not amuse me.
How does it happen the opinion of one man who is a dedicated political satirist gets called "one-sided?" By its very nature, Trudeau's opinion is his own and no one else's, and therefore it represents one side. His. I understand that this *is* one sided, but you cannot very well expect someone to represent two sides in any meaningful way. He has an opinion, and even if he payed lip service to other opinions, they would be *his* representations. I feel this is something a lot of people aren't getting with the media. If you have a side, you can only serve that side in the end. That's why FOX news is not "fair and balanced" and neither is CNN or NBC. The idea that they actually *think* they can represent two sides, your that you do, is what's wonky here.
I suggest reading Trudeau because he's intelligent and expressive of a certain opinion. The best thing you can say, even if you dislike him in all other facets, is that he expresses himself as honestly and effectively as he can. How can you dislike him for not agreeing with you, or pretending to?
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What you said has nothing to do with what daventor wrote, though.
Why would you read a comic strip (i.e. a static, graphic, humor peice) if the humor does not appeal to you?
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quote:Originally posted by daventor: I usually skip over Doonesbury. Me and Trudeau are are on different sides of the fence politically so his one-sided conservative-bashing usually does not amuse me. But for whatever reason I actually did read the comic yesterday and enjoyed it greatly. Extremists on both sides could use a little more perspective like this.
If you think what Gary Trudeau does is "one side conservative bashing" they you haven't read much of his work. What Trudeau does is much better described as social commentary. It is commentary from a liberal perspective that you might not share, but is very rarely simple "bashing". He doesn't hit the mark every day, but he is often very insightful even when I disagree with him.
That's something I simply haven't seen from the conservative comics out there.
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quote:his one-sided conservative-bashing usually does not amuse me.
You do realize that Trudeau's two central characters; BD and Mike Doonesbury, are both republican conservatives?
I get sick of hearing people who don't read Doonesbury talk about how one-sided he is. Trudeau has been especially sensitive in his treatment of BD, and Toggle, two characters that were wounded during service in Iraq.
While BD used to be the butt of many anti-conservative jokes, the story of the attack that nearly killed him and cost him his leg, his slow recovery and difficulty adjusting back to civilian life has been central in Trudeau's development of a perspective on the war in Iraq. The scene when they removed his helmet for the first time might have been comical, but instead it drew tears from most of Trudeau's readership, who didn't realize how BD had become such a central and sympathetic character in their own lives.
In retrospect, Trudeau has always treated his conservative characters with the same respect that any person deserves. Mark Slackmeyer's relationship with his conservative lover Chase mirrors his own tumultuous relationship with his conservative father, whom he loved despite their differences. Republican congresswoman Lacey Davenport was treated with nothing but respect.
Conversely, his ultra liberal characters, such as Zonker, are treated with vary little respect. While Zonker is likeable, his drug use and refusal to take responsibility for anything are anything but respectable. Somehow BD tolerates him as a nanny for his daughter, which says more about BD's loyalty to his friends more than it says of Zonker's worthiness.
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I would also mention that the one person Trudeau bashed more thoroughly and consistently over the years was Hunter S. Thompson and Thompson is anything but a conservative.
(For those who don't know, the character Duke is an admitted caricature of Thomspon).
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Well, I shall confess that I've never read much of Doonesbury, so I can't really judge how biased or fair to his characters he is. I just know the few times I have looked at it in the past it didn't really appeal to me.
I do find a lot of social satire/humor, even when it's coming from the Liberal perspective or is mocking conservatives, funny, though; I always got a kick out of Will Ferrel's Bush impersonations, Tina Fey's Palin, and [though I don't watch them much anymore] Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert (as a parody of Conservativism). To each his own.
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quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: And yet Duke is definitely a "conservative."
Seriously, yes, Trudeau tries to be fair-minded. At times.
He very rarely succeeds, however. His work does indeed drip with bias.
Duke, like Hunter S. Thompson, can't be pidgeon holed in any political category and "conservative" definitely doesn't work. At least not in 21st century America where cultural conservatives dominate the right wing.
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Duke is used as a bad parody of conservative thought whenever conservative thought is required; he will be made homophobic, rabidly nationalistic, militaristic, opportunistic, etc. as the plot demands. He's possibly the least consistent character in terms of political belief -- which makes some sense, since he's consistently portrayed as ultimately self-serving and short-sighted and thus unlikely to actually possess any sincerely-held principles.
But he has long been Trudeau's go-to mouthpiece for the wackier elements of right-wing movements over three decades.
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I read Doonesbury regularly, along with most other comics, mostly because it's there when I'm *ahem* occupied in some way or another.
I'm a liberal on most social issues, and I gotta say, it takes a strange perspective in my opinion to read Doonesbury and not think it's, as Tom says, dripping with bias. And I think Trudeau's right a lot, too.
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I do think Doonesbury is biased, but wouldn't consider it any more biased than the Daily show.
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I did not mean to imply Doonesbury wasn't liberally slanted. But having a liberal bias is not equal to "one-sided conservative-bashing". Trudeau is a masterful social satirist who clearly has strong personal opinions that show in his work. Many of those opinions on issues like corporate power, militarism, racism, feminism, and poverty are accurately labeled 'liberal'. But some of other social issues he has satirized for years, like the drug culture (Duke and Zonker), the slacker culture (Zonker and Zipper), the new age movement (Boopsie), the media (Rowland Headly), activism (Mark Slackmeyer), modern art (J.J.) etc. can't really be called "liberal" in a meaningful way.
Doonesbury is far too nuanced to be called "one-sided conservative-bashing". Yes, he very often bashes certain aspects of conservatism, but he doesn't limit himself to that. He bashed Bill Clinton very nearly as often as he bashed G.W. Bush. And unlike the right wing political cartoonists who've risen up to counter him in the comic pages, Trudeau actually does insightful satire most of the time.
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quote:Originally posted by daventor: I usually skip over Doonesbury. Me and Trudeau are are on different sides of the fence politically so his one-sided conservative-bashing usually does not amuse me. But for whatever reason I actually did read the comic yesterday and enjoyed it greatly. Extremists on both sides could use a little more perspective like this.
He and I are also on different sides of the fence politically. Doesn't stop me from enjoying the strip.
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quote:Seriously, yes, Trudeau tries to be fair-minded. At times.
He very rarely succeeds, however. His work does indeed drip with bias.
I disagree with your assessment that he rarely succeeds. And as far as labeling his work liberal is concerned, Michelle Malkin defines GWB as being liberal, and Rush Limbaugh defines anyone to the left of himself as being liberal. It all depends on where you decide to place the center.
Personally I think Colbert says it best: "Reality has a liberal bias." Conservatives would like us to think that certain mainstream, basic issues, such as environmentalism, are liberal. They aren't. They are reality. I don't think Trudeau makes much of an effort to be fair, per se. If he wants to take someone to task, fairness doesn't really enter into it. But the complexity and diversity of his world and the characters in it are brilliantly created to reflect the real world, including its insanity from both sides of the aisle. That's hardly one-sided.
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quote:He and I are also on different sides of the fence politically. Doesn't stop me from enjoying the strip.
This is important. Not everyone enjoys Trudeau's humor and not everyone agrees with his politics, but you don't have to agree with his politics to enjoy his satire. Its usual good satire, its witty and insightful and its almost always factually accurate. That's what distinguishes him from the all one-sided bashers out there. Mallard Filmore and Rush Limbaugh haven't made a liberal laugh once in two decades. Their humor isn't witty or insightful, its juvenile and mean spirited. It's the same style humor the junior high school "in clique" made about the social misfits. I'm sure there must be liberal examples of this kind of low brow humor as well, but Doonesbury isn't one of them.
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quote: And as far as labeling his work liberal is concerned, Michelle Malkin defines GWB as being liberal, and Rush Limbaugh defines anyone to the left of himself as being liberal. It all depends on where you decide to place the center.
Just because two dopes can't figure out what's liberal and what's not doesn't mean that there can't be a fair assessment of what's liberal or not.
EXAMPLE:
Doonesbury: liberal Prickly City: conservative Mallard Fillmore: utterly brain-dead
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quote:He and I are also on different sides of the fence politically. Doesn't stop me from enjoying the strip.
This is important. Not everyone enjoys Trudeau's humor and not everyone agrees with his politics, but you don't have to agree with his politics to enjoy his satire. Its usual good satire, its witty and insightful and its almost always factually accurate. That's what distinguishes him from the all one-sided bashers out there. Mallard Filmore and Rush Limbaugh haven't made a liberal laugh once in two decades. Their humor isn't witty or insightful, its juvenile and mean spirited. It's the same style humor the junior high school "in clique" made about the social misfits. I'm sure there must be liberal examples of this kind of low brow humor as well, but Doonesbury isn't one of them.
Doonesbury's opposite number is Day by Day. Rush Limbaugh's opposite number is Michael Moore.
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Day by Day's been too far off the deep end for too many years to be an opposite of Doonesbury.
It just styles itself after DB but since about 2004-2006 it's been little more than a copy/paste attack ad.
The best conservative analogue to DB is Prickly City considering it is similarly 'tempered enough for the mainstream' and actually has some coverage. DbD sort of ruts itself by being a bad comic.Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
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