Following up to the letter to the editor I posted last week expressing disgust with “profanity” in Pearls Before Swine, here’s this one by The Argyle Sweater’s Scott Hilburn posted on the GoComics blog that is just as flagrant. It’s just a matter of time before we start hearing our young children yelling obscenities like, “you hash tag percent sign ampersand exclamation point asterisk hole…” at other kids on the play ground. We just can’t have that.
(Sign) More profanity in comics
16 thoughts on “(Sign) More profanity in comics”
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My character Charmy swears at least two strips a week. I guess I should relook at his character!… lol… Oh it is so tough trying to get your strip accepted……. especially when your main character drinks a lot. Maybe I should rethink that as well…….
You have to ask yourself, do I HAVE to imply swearing to get my character’s point across to the reader? If the answer is “yes”, is that truly “family friendly” content?
Ahhhhh….remember the old days when we called someone a ‘number sign?’….now it’s hash tag…
The times they are a changin’…
I don’t think any comic strip character should curse. Of course, it isn’t the character’s fault but only the creator who has the potty mouth. 🙂
When reading comics to my son I would say “blankety-blank!” whenever there was some #@*!! indicated. Then he started saying “What the blankety-blank” as an expression of frustration. He says he knows all the worst swear words anyway, like “H-E-double-hockey sticks”.
Ha! Donna, you beat me to it. Even an old dog like Alan has been converted.
Swear words are a poor substitute for good humor, but unfortunately that’s often how they’re used. I think if used (and sparingly), they should be a natural expression of a character or, even better, an unexpected swearing from a character who otherwise would never swear but just finally lost it.
Popeye perfected purple prose. “Why you I oughta…”If I wasn’t such a gentle-ming…”, (feel free to add yours)
And then there was Yosemite Sam, who said “rackafracka” and “rassafrassa.” That guy was always dropping R-bombs.
Someone should create a single panel feature and call it “Rackafracka.” Actually maybe not – that name’s a little weak.
If you need a distraction from your just-passed-deadline, look up cussing and the new Oreo commercial. Parents are really upset about the fake cussing when the parents taste the new cookie.
These are probably the same parents who killed the (very funny) Fios commercial where the kid talks to the Fios installer. Parents apparently complained that the kid talking to the service tech was inappropriate.
Kids should watch more porn. There’s less dialogue and less opportunity for cussing.
Scott. It’s already happened. Check http://www.gocomics.com/rackafracka
The best substitute swearing of all in comics comes from Captain Haddock in the TinTin books. Billions of blue blistering barcacles! etc. for a full list go to http://www.tintinologist.org/guides/lists/curses.html
@Rick – Old dog? Just cuz I can remember phones had cords and had to be dialed by turning a wheel….
Oh never mind. I’ll own that title.
Don’t forget that Donald Duck is one of the all-time blistering-words champs. Although you couldn’t understand him, he was a sailor after all.
Andrew – I was just messing around yesterday. Fritz is a friend of mine. And Rackafracka is a fine name for a comic feature. Although he needs to do a Yosemite Sam gag.
I read (and write) those cartoon curses as something like “blankety-blank” too. Until the time that Jay Kennedy from King Features was reading one of my gag submissions back to me, and he actually filled-in the #@$ with the F-bomb. Which is not what my character would have said. I was taken aback and asked him if he always goes there when he reads those things and he said that he did. Made me rethink my use of those (to me) harmless symbols.