Ted Rall Makes More Enemies

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/05/04/SPG5K6FD091.DTL

What's with this cowardly tendancy to try and censor everything nowdays? Can't they see it usually backfires. I think it's a stupid and mostly rude comic but to go from there to censorship is pretty pathetic. Plus sometimes I think he's hilarious.

Well since you put it that way, you've convinced me. Any technical advice on the best way for my presence to vacate your universe would be greatly appreciated seeing as your so clever and all.

andy,

I agree. Smug and self-righteous are a truly noxious combination.

but i suppose that very statement is a negative in and of itself, heh.

Rall's always been an idiot, which is why everybody in the comics business already hates him. Now lots of other people hate him. I've been basically ambivalent, I even read his 1984 rip-off just to see what the fuss was about - at this point, if he never gets hired again except by the occasional free college town 'radical' weekly, I'd consider that perfectly just, not censorship at all. Perhaps some think of it as censorship that Momus isn't on Top 40 radio (get a brain morans).

More germane to other discussions than this one, but I'm going to say it nonetheless: There are still a great deal of people who seem to not get the idea that policy is not the responsibility of the soldier in the field. We live in a representative democracy, whether you like it or not. You fill in the fucking blanks.

(I love it when some joker gets all sanctimonious and busts out the ironic "clever" and so forth, and does the dumbass "your"/"you're" thing [or one of its variants] in a post. always classic, that.)

also, m. white, i'd go into a big ranty lecture about what 'censorship' actually is, prior restraint, etc, but i doubt it'd make a difference

God dammit.

going to iraq and afghanistan to blow up a shadowy non-state entity doesnt correlate in any way to someone's right to publish something.

So but hey how come if that's true ppl are giving Rall a hard time about it? I'd think that a pro-Army should, logically, and I'm not bein' funny here, sound like this: "Guy's spoutin' off? And I disagree with him? Hot-ass, the system works!" But when you write the part I've copied-in, it sounds like what you mean is "if Rall were actually conscious of this, he wouldn't say what he's saying" i.e. the very free speech you want to defend & protect (for which God bless you! for reals!) is something you don't actually think should be voiced, which is weird to me.

To bill stevens,
you're right, we carry our constitutional rights in this:
http://pes.eunet.cz/obrazky/2002/01/18361_3_obrazek.jpg

xpost I know! I am NOT the guy who cries "censorship" whenever somebody doesn't want somebody to talk! nb nb nb nb!!! that guy is NOT me!!! 'cause, um, I HATE that kinda shit! I'm just legimately interested in what strikes me as a fairly discussable intersection of belief & action

I don't know, I don't think it's any different, really -- that's the whole goal, to be able to have a strong negative reaction to something, something that makes you want to pop the guy in the nose, and still think that no one has the right to prevent him from saying it. There's a huge leap from "you shouldn't have said that" to "someone should have prevented you from saying it, because you didn't have the right." When you disagree with hypothetical posters on ILX who might get you riled by saying ridiculous things, when those things are just balls-to-the-wall wrong -- factually, morally, whatever -- I'm assuming you don't think they should have said them ... but you don't think they lacked the right, do you?

Gwen Knapp's article succeeds by reiterating something clear that was shown publically on TV -- a life was lost, the complexities of that fellow citizen that was lost steers away from ridiculous good/bad distinctions, etc. I learned something from that article about Tillman, his friends and family, and the nature of public discussion and consideration in America 2004 (exactly when and where in earlier American history beyond these last few -- VERY few -- decades would a discussion of perceptions of homosexuality not laden with fire-and-brimstone BS have been brought up in such a widely covered memorial service, for instance?). I learned nothing from Rall that I didn't already know about him.

Tom's point is a good one, though the new email addy is kinda disturbing - I know it's s'posed to be funny, and I agree with C.S. Lewis that if you're gonna go to war you should do it balls-out and not with a grim "I have to do this, but I'm against war on principle" attitude: but going to war is one thing & talking about it another.

I remain puzzled, as I have been since childhood, by the notions that 1) you can't say bad things about soldiers, as they are defending our country and 2) you super-can't say bad things about soldiers who died on the field of battle. I think it's fair to be puzzled about this. My father served in the merchant marines in WWII so anybody who thinks I'm just some dyed-in-the-wool lefty spouting off instead of actually thinking some discussion other than "fuck Ted Rall!" is in order can eat me raw.

Don't you know that theres soldiers in afghanistan reading ilx RIGHT NOW in order to shore up their resolve??

thanks for fucking this up.

signed,
don rumsfeld

Plus I think you should get acquainted with the guy before you go off and fuck him.

Not that I'm going to vote for dubya.

no, it's a much more evil message than that. it's a complete lie. the message is clearly meant to be read as, "THEY deserve it because THEY flew those planes into our buildings." which of course they didn't actually do. that higgins cartoon is pretty much the entire lie of the iraq war laid bare.

I'm also bothered by the image of the kids in the Higgins cartoon. It's attempts to assert poignance and innocence, but stop me if I'm wrong -- don't Iraqis have children too?

I never heard of Rall before today. Reading this thread it seems he doesn't come across too well. I was searching to see if anyone had read this book

http://www.amazon.com/Silk-Road-Ruin-Central-Middle/dp/1561634549

maybe he's a better writer than cartoonist?

http://picayune.uclick.com/comics/trall/2007/trall071022.gif
....

chortle

And now he might as well be Kelly at the Onion:

http://opinion.latimes.com/.a/6a00d8341c7de353ef0147e26e56ae970b-500wi

Wow the one posted above that is disgusting. I've got friends in Iraq who are most definitely not stupid. Of course he gives the idiot at the end an "I heart sports" shirt, as though sports fans are dumb lol. Is there a level of satire that I'm not picking up here or is he really this terrible?

He is really this terrible.

Yeah, I just read the whole thread. He writes (and draws) like a 13 year old with big "problems with the world" (aka things that Ted Rall dislikes). I know because this is EXACTLY the sort of thing I would have done as a 13-year old cartoonist when I drew comics for my middle school; just like, "here's my viewpoint and I don't care if it is correct"

I think I was 16 or 17 when I kind of had an epiphany, that a cartoonist's job is always to make the material FUNNY first and make your point second, because it's hard to really tie the things together sometimes and everyone's just going to disagree with you anyway. That's where I had heard of Ted Rall; he sued some cartoonist who pulled a prank on him for $1.5 million and the guy ended up really suffering, which seemed just like a shit thing to do to someone in the same line of work as you. I made a comic about Rall comparing him to Jim Davis, basically saying that Garfield is written by making jokes about pretty broad personality traits (Garfield is fat, lazy, always hungry, cruel, etc., Jon is a loser, etc. etc.), and that in the end Davis could do a political comic strip as well as Rall could do one, or that Rall was barely qualified to write Garfield, I really can't remember...have to dig that one up.

There was some mention of Tom Tomorrow...I was a big fan of his in the pre-Bush era. Since then he's gotten a lot angrier and progressively less funny; satire turned into ranting. I wonder what he's up to these days. Maybe (as suggested) the Bush era just kind of took all the urge to just be funny and start getting angry, which is death for a political cartoonist.

Will THIS finally put paid to the guy. (It's the preceding editors' note that needs the focus here.)

http://www.latimes.com/opinion/opinion-la/la-ol-rall-lapd-crosswalk-tickets-20150511-story.html

Checking in:

http://rall.com/comic/bernie-sanders-endorsed-hillary-clinton

http://22i18l42a516x0glw28vyk8x4k.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/7-15-16-768x580.jpg

After a hard-fought primary campaign, Bernie Sanders capitulated and endorsed his rival Hillary Clinton for the presidency. In the final analysis, Clinton gave up little more than lip service to Bernie’s agenda of a $15 minimum wage, free college tuition at public universities, and universal healthcare. To the contrary, Clinton is now moving to the right, considering a general as vice president and asking the platform committee not to oppose the TPP free trade agreement.

http://rall.com/comic/pokemon-go-hillary-trump

http://22i18l42a516x0glw28vyk8x4k.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/7-19-16.jpg

The video game sensation “Pokemon Go” has led players to weird places like the National Holocaust Museum, Rikers Island prison in New York, and even drug sales locations. Hey, maybe this app can be used to do good!

http://22i18l42a516x0glw28vyk8x4k.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/7-25-16.jpg

http://rall.com/comic/hillary-clinton-a-disaster-for-democrats

The party candidate isn’t true to its basic principles, lies, is ruthless, breaks the law and has record-high disapproval ratings in the polls. How the hell did America’s oldest political party wind up with such a terrible candidate? Easy: they plotted and schemed.

http://rall.com/comic/hillary-clinton-lesser-evilism

http://22i18l42a516x0glw28vyk8x4k.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/7-27-16.jpg

The 2016 Democratic national convention is being highlighted by the discussion over whether or not to vote for Hillary Clinton as a so-called lesser evil.” Even if you don’t like her or her policies, mainstream Democrats say, it’s important to vote for her because otherwise, Donald Trump will be elected and he will be worse. But what happens if, in the next election, Donald Trump runs against someone worse than Donald Trump? Would Donald Trump be the best choice then? If so, why would be unjustified to vote for him now?

i don't think the moral of that is the one he intends.

this guy is prob my least favorite cartoonist in the world, comparing him to jim davis is an insult to davis

like even apart from his obnoxious views and weirdly high opinion of himself his style is just ugly and unappealing and incompetent

that's true of 99% of contemporary political cartoonists

it's really not. it's almost like he takes special care to not give a shit about his backgrounds and layout.