5 ms·

I see a lot of the "why do people hate Comic Sans" articles on the web think it's just because it's a handwritten, casual font used in inappropriate situations,

I see a lot of the "why do people hate Comic Sans" articles on the web think it's just because it's a handwritten, casual font used in inappropriate situations, but this seems like post-hoc rationalization. It's the Comic Sans look specifically that people intensely dislike, not "handwritten" fonts in general. The original and better case against Comic Sans was that there were much better handwritten, comic-text-style fonts and that Comic Sans was a particularly bad instance of one. Just ask Dave Gibbons: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2009/aug/12/dave-gibbons-watchmen-interview https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2009/aug/12/dave-gibb... >"It's just a shame they couldn't have used just the original font, because it's a real mess. I think it's a particularly ugly letter form," he says. "The other thing that really bugs me that they've used an upper case I with bars on it: it looks completely wrong to the comic eye. And when you see store fronts done in it, it's horrible."

justsomehnguy 3y ago
> it's just because it's a handwritten, casual font used in inappropriate situations It's a handwritten, casual font used in inappropriate situations /and the only available for anything 'fancy' on the Average Computer used by Average Joe/.
fsckboy 3y ago
stylistically, my personal taste is that Comic Sans is exactly the right font to use for serious warning signs like in a kitchen, such as "DON'T TOUCH, handle gets HOT" or something. Anything official looking I have a tendency to ignore as boilerplate, but comic sans seems like a personal friendly message directed at me if any of the objection is to the precise letter drawings, ok fine, give me a different one, but the overall concept, I'm Comic Sans all the way.
- derefr 3y ago
  If you want jarring so that you don’t ignore it, use Impact or Copperplate.
  - fsckboy 3y ago
    I completely disagree, though, you're not getting my point. There is a type of "standard" warning that I routinely ignore, the "don't cut yourself with the tablesaw" warnings. Or "knife is sharp". Like, yeah, that's why I'm using the knife. A warning I won't ignore is one written by a friend about something unusual or unexpected. "The supposedly insulated handle on this pot will melt your fingers off" I just think that comic sans draws my eye in, in a way that Copperplate instructions from HR do not. Don't tell HR, or they'll start using Comic Sans.
    - derefr 3y ago
      Apologies, I mixed up the font I had meant. I meant to refer to things like https://www.fontspace.com/hardsign-font-f46378 https://www.fontspace.com/hardsign-font-f46378, or https://www.fontspace.com/the-ranch-font-f88750 https://www.fontspace.com/the-ranch-font-f88750, or the various Fraktur fonts that you mostly see in tattoo-art these days. These fonts are not normally used on warning signs. Unless you consider old-west "WANTED" posters to be warning signs. These are fonts that are not just eye-catching, but actively painful to look at for how striking they are, to the point that they're even maybe a bit hard to read (but you still end up reading them, because it's hard to look away.) These are fonts that scream at you — fonts HR would never dare to use, even knowing they "work", because it'd be unprofessional to be that attention-grabbing. It'd be the typographic equivalent of blowing an airhorn in a small room in order to interrupt someone. Or you can go the other way, and just put an actual picture of the grim reaper on your sign: https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/58b3vj/stop_prevent_your_death_eagles_nest_sinkhole/ https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/58b3vj/stop_prevent_y... . (Though actually, oddly enough, something about that typography makes me feel threatened even without the image. I think that particular tight leading with all-caps lettering using a high-weight sans-serif font, puts me in mind of specific public civic-engineering uses of typography to warn people away from high-voltage power substations, large AM radio transmitters, hydro-dam spillways, etc. It's a subtle thing, but it's enough to make it really not look like your standard HR print-out. See also: the old shield of the US Department of Civil Defense — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_defense_in_the_United_States#/media/File:United_States_Civil_Defense_Roundel.svg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_defense_in_the_United_St.... Seeing that on something is just unsettling — for purely typographic reasons!)
- kyle-rb 3y ago
  I'm imagining huge Comic Sans lettering: "This place is not a place of honor... no highly esteemed deed is commemorated here... nothing valued is here."
- tomjakubowski 3y ago
  100%. A cartoon with the warning helps too.
- brazzledazzle 3y ago
  My favorite comic sans note taped to an office fridge ended with “sorry for the incontinence” and once I had a good chuckle I read the part above it that I had previously ignored.
- boredhedgehog 3y ago
  > like a personal friendly message directed at me Yes, like a clown talking to you while honking his nose. Amusing and ignorable.

justsomehnguy 3y ago

> it's just because it's a handwritten, casual font used in inappropriate situations It's a handwritten, casual font used in inappropriate situations /and the only available for anything 'fancy' on the Average Computer used by Average Joe/.

fsckboy 3y ago

stylistically, my personal taste is that Comic Sans is exactly the right font to use for serious warning signs like in a kitchen, such as "DON'T TOUCH, handle gets HOT" or something. Anything official looking I have a tendency to ignore as boilerplate, but comic sans seems like a personal friendly message directed at me if any of the objection is to the precise letter drawings, ok fine, give me a different one, but the overall concept, I'm Comic Sans all the way.

derefr 3y ago
If you want jarring so that you don’t ignore it, use Impact or Copperplate.
- fsckboy 3y ago
  I completely disagree, though, you're not getting my point. There is a type of "standard" warning that I routinely ignore, the "don't cut yourself with the tablesaw" warnings. Or "knife is sharp". Like, yeah, that's why I'm using the knife. A warning I won't ignore is one written by a friend about something unusual or unexpected. "The supposedly insulated handle on this pot will melt your fingers off" I just think that comic sans draws my eye in, in a way that Copperplate instructions from HR do not. Don't tell HR, or they'll start using Comic Sans.
  - derefr 3y ago
    Apologies, I mixed up the font I had meant. I meant to refer to things like https://www.fontspace.com/hardsign-font-f46378 https://www.fontspace.com/hardsign-font-f46378, or https://www.fontspace.com/the-ranch-font-f88750 https://www.fontspace.com/the-ranch-font-f88750, or the various Fraktur fonts that you mostly see in tattoo-art these days. These fonts are not normally used on warning signs. Unless you consider old-west "WANTED" posters to be warning signs. These are fonts that are not just eye-catching, but actively painful to look at for how striking they are, to the point that they're even maybe a bit hard to read (but you still end up reading them, because it's hard to look away.) These are fonts that scream at you — fonts HR would never dare to use, even knowing they "work", because it'd be unprofessional to be that attention-grabbing. It'd be the typographic equivalent of blowing an airhorn in a small room in order to interrupt someone. Or you can go the other way, and just put an actual picture of the grim reaper on your sign: https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/58b3vj/stop_prevent_your_death_eagles_nest_sinkhole/ https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/58b3vj/stop_prevent_y... . (Though actually, oddly enough, something about that typography makes me feel threatened even without the image. I think that particular tight leading with all-caps lettering using a high-weight sans-serif font, puts me in mind of specific public civic-engineering uses of typography to warn people away from high-voltage power substations, large AM radio transmitters, hydro-dam spillways, etc. It's a subtle thing, but it's enough to make it really not look like your standard HR print-out. See also: the old shield of the US Department of Civil Defense — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_defense_in_the_United_States#/media/File:United_States_Civil_Defense_Roundel.svg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_defense_in_the_United_St.... Seeing that on something is just unsettling — for purely typographic reasons!)
kyle-rb 3y ago
I'm imagining huge Comic Sans lettering: "This place is not a place of honor... no highly esteemed deed is commemorated here... nothing valued is here."
tomjakubowski 3y ago
100%. A cartoon with the warning helps too.
brazzledazzle 3y ago
My favorite comic sans note taped to an office fridge ended with “sorry for the incontinence” and once I had a good chuckle I read the part above it that I had previously ignored.
boredhedgehog 3y ago
> like a personal friendly message directed at me Yes, like a clown talking to you while honking his nose. Amusing and ignorable.