4 ms·

Remember "Doonesbury." Might've been funny once but degraded into political polemics for the last decade or more. Once you've got an audience the temptation to

Remember "Doonesbury." Might've been funny once but degraded into political polemics for the last decade or more. Once you've got an audience the temptation to use their trust to persuade them of, well, anything; seems to be hard to resist. Moreso when you have opinions that others emphatically do not share. I can think of dozens of "liberal comics" that never tried to be funny, that were merely political propaganda in comic form. Most of Ted Rall's work, for example.

pram 4y ago
Doonesbury was never funny.
- zafka 4y ago
  I beg to differ :) I guess a lot depends on set and setting.
  - mmmpop 4y ago
    > :) Give us an example? Surely not last Sunday's. I think maybe 3 weeks ago I got a good chuckle but that's every other month or so.
- Retric 4y ago
  Doonesbury is occasionally hilarious, but a lot of strips are setups for a later payoff.
- mmmpop 4y ago
  It has its moments but you have to assume Garry Trudeau is a phenomenally insufferable person.
SeanLuke 4y ago
> Might've been funny once but degraded into political polemics for the last decade or more. What are you talking about? Doonesbury has been a proudly, and heavily, political comic since the 1960s.
- parrellel 4y ago
  He's confusing it with Bloom County, prolly.
  - danaris 4y ago
    Bloom County? The comic that was pretty openly political back in 1983? Sure, there were stretches of time where it didn't address anything particularly politics-related, but to suggest that it was not political seems to quite spectacularly miss the point.
    - parrellel 4y ago
      Ah, but it was funny!
- bena 4y ago
  This is akin to complaining about Rage Against the Machine getting political
- mmmpop 4y ago
  > What the Hell Is Up with Dilbert? What are you talking about? The OP made it clear that it was once funny and then it devolved into partisan preaching that lacked humor entirely. Never once did OP claim it wasn't political in the first place, why would you assume that?
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- prepend 4y ago
  I started reading doonesbury in the 80s just because it was on the comics page. I never found it funny and didn’t get it. I’ve heard people describe that it was once funny way back in the day but was never able to confirm it.
dghlsakjg 4y ago
Doonesbury was a political comic basically since inception. He won a Pulitzer prize for a contemporary comic about Watergate.
woodruffw 4y ago
Did we read the same Doonesbury? His drawings throughout Watergate are probably some of the most famous politically charged humorous cartoons in history. I was never a particularly big Doonesbury fan (I like Pogo), but griping about "liberal comics" seems to follow the general trend of not realizing that your politics have been on the outside of mainstream cartooning for decades.
unethical_ban 4y ago
If you think Doonesbury was ever not political, I have a cloud saas as a service Id like to sell to you.

pram 4y ago

Doonesbury was never funny.

zafka 4y ago
I beg to differ :) I guess a lot depends on set and setting.
- mmmpop 4y ago
  > :) Give us an example? Surely not last Sunday's. I think maybe 3 weeks ago I got a good chuckle but that's every other month or so.
Retric 4y ago
Doonesbury is occasionally hilarious, but a lot of strips are setups for a later payoff.
mmmpop 4y ago
It has its moments but you have to assume Garry Trudeau is a phenomenally insufferable person.

SeanLuke 4y ago

> Might've been funny once but degraded into political polemics for the last decade or more. What are you talking about? Doonesbury has been a proudly, and heavily, political comic since the 1960s.

parrellel 4y ago
He's confusing it with Bloom County, prolly.
- danaris 4y ago
  Bloom County? The comic that was pretty openly political back in 1983? Sure, there were stretches of time where it didn't address anything particularly politics-related, but to suggest that it was not political seems to quite spectacularly miss the point.
  - parrellel 4y ago
    Ah, but it was funny!
bena 4y ago
This is akin to complaining about Rage Against the Machine getting political
mmmpop 4y ago
> What the Hell Is Up with Dilbert? What are you talking about? The OP made it clear that it was once funny and then it devolved into partisan preaching that lacked humor entirely. Never once did OP claim it wasn't political in the first place, why would you assume that?
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
prepend 4y ago
I started reading doonesbury in the 80s just because it was on the comics page. I never found it funny and didn’t get it. I’ve heard people describe that it was once funny way back in the day but was never able to confirm it.

dghlsakjg 4y ago

Doonesbury was a political comic basically since inception. He won a Pulitzer prize for a contemporary comic about Watergate.

woodruffw 4y ago

Did we read the same Doonesbury? His drawings throughout Watergate are probably some of the most famous politically charged humorous cartoons in history. I was never a particularly big Doonesbury fan (I like Pogo), but griping about "liberal comics" seems to follow the general trend of not realizing that your politics have been on the outside of mainstream cartooning for decades.

unethical_ban 4y ago

If you think Doonesbury was ever not political, I have a cloud saas as a service Id like to sell to you.