CSotD: Saturday Short Takes
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I could probably do a Juxtaposition of the Day using Mr. Fitz and Dilbert five or six days a week if I didn't mind an occasional stretch. It would be a waffer-theen stretch, I promise you.
Specifically, old timers will remember when Dilbert had a "mission statement generator" on its site that would crank out vapid, cliche-filled platitudes that were delightfully indistinguishable from the ones cobbled together in endless training sessions, often by breaking up into groups and then coming back to share.
This kind of thing gives me a weird mix of PTSD and schadenfreude, which is to say I have sat through a lot of those trainings, in business and in education, and it gives me the heebie-jeebies to relive them, but also a deep gratitude to not have to sit through them anymore, hence joy at the fate of those who must.
Mr. Fitz does that to me a lot. I don't follow Dilbert in part because it seems to have fallen into the same Repetitive Gag Syndrome that has Sarge stomping on Beetle and Dagwood colliding with the mailman, and in part because I'm no longer impacted by the inanities of office life.
But I still care about education, and I still work a lot with kids and, at least indirectly, teachers, and the Submission to Authority element that Mr. Fitz cites here is indeed a cancer not just on the profession but on the system and process.
It's not that I would want chaos, with each teacher following a different vision and method. But failure to question authority is how you end up with the theory-as-dogma of Common Core, and asinine policies like Maine's use of the SAT to track achievement.
I don't expect everyone to design an outfit for the emperor, but they sure need to be able to tell when he's buck naked.
And it goes beyond accepting unproven pedagogical ideas as gospel. It also includes mistaking cheerful, inviting content for quality material, especially if it has a familiar brand name.
The other day, I railed about award-winning books that lay Important Lessons on with a trowel, but the opposite end of that is exemplified in the current dustup over a chipper, cheerful kids' book about George Washington's happy slave and how, lawzy, he just loved cooking for the Father of Our (not his) Country.
As noted there, the book, which celebrates his joy in cooking for the General with his cute little daughter, doesn't mention that he ran away to escape slavery, leaving her behind. And that she was cool with that because she knew being a slave sucked.
(Update: According to the negative review from School Library Journal on Amazon's site, there is a small-print author's note at the end detailing the facts. I guess this means it was not a case of sloppy research but a deliberate lie.)
Scholastic isn't the only children's publisher cranking out cheerful bogus history, but they are certainly the 800-pound gorilla, particularly when curriculum committees sit down to decide what resources to purchase.
This one is getting pretty universally shouted down by both critics and readers, but the story of Washington's cookin'-and-jivin' slave isn't alone in this flood of cheerful, ahistoric drivel: There are also books explaining how Indians learned to adapt to life at the Carlisle School, and how the Trail of Tears was sad, yes, but you can make the best of things if you try.
Here's my mission statement:
"We will endeavor to find quality teaching materials by examining them
with a critical eye rather than by assuming that familiar
brand names are a guarantee."
Now, on to my own chosen drivel:
I follow King of the Royal Mounted for its camp value, but the new story arc is a gob-smacker, even for King, and today's episode knocked me out of my chair.
I'm willing to chalk up the cover story of "Don't worry about me. I'm just here to arrest an Indian," as not only within the sensitivities of 1940 when the strip appeared, but something that would seem perfectly plausible, however the hearer viewed it in terms of justice.
But Benton Harbor? Benton Harbor?
Don't talk about Benton Harbor!
Benton Harbor?
Granted, it's not a huge place — 16,668 people in 1940 — but it's only 100 miles from Chicago, and people from there flock to the Dunes … and it's not exactly in Mountie jurisdiction … well, anyway, if it was a shout-out, it was a damn silly one.
Though not as silly as the thought bubbles in that middle panel, which, to stay with football another moment, remind me of Joe Montana's "Sincere Guy" sketch from SNL.
And King is, certainly, a sincere guy.
For instance, having successfully put forth his cover story, he sincerely blurts out his true mission in the final panel.
Screw the Prime Directive: I love this strip.
Meanwhile, back in some other harbor
In February, 1929, Elsie Segar brought a minor character into Thimble Theater. Now, it's July, he's back, and some of these folks better start updating their resumes.
As long as we seem to be living in the past
Mike Lynch has some cartoons about Volkswagens from a 1961 collection VW put out. As he says, it's notable for the photographs of some of the top classic cartoonists of the era that accompany each gag, and, as such, a great tool for connecting familiar styles and familiar names with actual faces. I'm not sure I'd seen anything but self-caricatures of any but a few of these cartooning greats.
F'rinstance, I've always assumed VIP looked like this.
And while we're on the subject
That was then
This is now. As Dan Wasserman notes, they discovered some new reasons to make design changes.
And, finally …
I think Dave Coverly was very insensitive for not including her male sibling, Bro Peep.
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