From: ecsd@tfs.com (Eric C. S. Dynamic)
Subject: Re: "Family Circle" Scheduling Program
Organization: The Great Beast 666
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 09:35:46 GMT

gmark@cbnewse.cb.att.com (gilbert.m.stewart) writes:

> Family Circus.
>There's also the ghost grandma and grampa sitting on clouds, ghosts
>of people inhabiting some area and those wacky "Ida Know" and "Not Me"
>things.  Keane's been brain-dead for quite awhile and should be shot
>to put him out of his misery.
>...
>Now, what about "Fred Bassett"?  Apparently Graham is from some other
>universe whose social structure centers around a fetish for chairs.
>Owner: "Fred!  Get out of my chair!"  Fred: "It's his favorite chair."
>Reader:  "Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!!"
>
>I read it whenever I get the time, so that might be part of why it's
>still written.  I just stare at it, slack-jawed, amazed that anyone
>actually sat down with this idea and decided to actually "draw" it
>up.  And "draw" is in quotes, because you'll notice Fred has maybe
>two poses, and seems to be a very amazing animal born with the ability
>to vary in size continually from panel to panel.  Where else can you
>find a comic strip "artist" who has no idea what a lawnmower looks
>like?  What population on this planet is supposed to relate to this
>couple?  
> ...
>I'm writing a strip about a mutant shrub that gains the ability to
>talk, and we get to hear about what shrubs think about all the time.
>Almost like Fred Bassett, but with more action.  I call it, "Those
>Wacky Shrubs"
>
>First Shrub: "Heyyyyy..."   Second Shrub: "Wellll....."
>First Shrub:  "Heyyyy..."  Second Shrub: "Welll...."
>
>Later That Day...
>
>First Shrub:  "Heyyy...."
>
>Reader: "Ha-ha-ha!"
>
>GMS

I don't know, so many of them are boring for most of the time, but they're
evidently filling people's needs - people want to see themselves reflected,
and a lot of people want "nice, calm humor" reflecting their ordinary lives,
as they live them - so like a newsgroup, people can tune into "Family Circus"
and get a dose of the humor around middle-class children when they want to.

That's why it's refreshing to see Roseanne and Bart Simpson and Sylvia,
because "we" begin to see ourselves reflected "as *we* are", and not as
the media have packaged life for us. Doonesbury, to be so popular while
being so left-political, and we see that times are changing.

Stale cartoons? Most of the old-timers have gotten stale; B.C. and The Wizard
Of Id, Dennis The Menace (will he ever grow At All?), Peanuts, certainly;
Andy Capp. Nobody even thinks about Mary Worth or the other one I forget,
are Always published. - Annie is so strung out, it's boring too - not enough
happens in four frames in one day to bother.

Once in a while, the older ones come out with really, really precious strips,
so that I'm not sorry. It's a culture shift. For a while I liked Cathy, then
I got tired of her helplessness - so okay, it's cute as a reflection of a
certain type of person, but by the time that *you* change and no longer
identify with that character, they *ought* to change too. They usually don't,
so you move on. I gave up on Ziggy too. I guess I got tired of having fun
identifying with helpless, hapless victims.

So who likes "Family Circle" enough to keep it in print? We don't know, but
maybe children do, maybe middle-class whites from a certain cultural mindset.
There are enough consumers to keep it in syndication, so that's all you have
to know - curiously, it *is* a reflection of the composition of the consuming
public - if you say *blecchh*, that's your opinion of society's values as a
whole composite thing. Apartment 3-G, Doctor - who, Rex somebody. Dear Abby,
as well. We obviously haven't reached a state of society where, e.g. yours
truly could write columns for the distressed, because the MASS does not
accept or tolerate it yet. Social change takes time - lots of it.

Awareness has a great deal to do with it. That's why I'm thrilled with Fox,
"Married with Children" - stupid, okay, but *honest* in the sense that
people are raunchy and petty and stupid quite often - so, let's *admit* it
and reflect our *true* natures to ourselves, and now that we see a lot of
self-critical, urbane humor out there, it tells us people are beginning to
accept their humanity on its own terms. We know that Bart Simpson truly
represents a genuine type, whose voice we have had to wait until now to hear.
So society - humans - are maturing, *finally*, to accept the truth of human
nature. I'm very glad for it. Bloom County, Calvin & Hobbes, Doonesbury,
Matt Groening, Sylvia, Sally Forth, Lynn Johnston, Rose is Rose, Mother Goose
and Grimm, Joe Martin, Bizzarro, Zippy the Pinhead.

How do you affect things? Hmm. I guess write in and TELL them; I *like*
X, Y and Z; I *don't* care for T, U and V. And one thing we don't get from
our newspapers as a service, e.g., is for them from time to time, PUBLISH
numbers of strips they Don't carry, to show us what is available.
None of the papers I can buy off the street here carry Alley Oop or Mutt and
Jeff, yet those are still in circulation that I know. So a lot of stuff is
out there that we don't know about. If you want to see certain things and
not others - make yourself heard about your desires. The squeaky wheel . . .
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