Saturday, March 31, 2018

So, John Kricfalusi, you whizzed on the electric fence, didn't you?

For the 3 people on the planet who haven't heard about the scandal around John Kricfalusi yet, here's a link to a brief synopsis on Cartoon Brew.

Of course, for anyone who has known (or just known about) John K for any length of time, this news comes as no shock.  It's like being told that Liberace was gay or that right now, at this very moment, a bear is shitting in the woods somewhere.

'Another Buzzfeed exclusive!"


Yeah, the guy is pretty much Henry the VIII without the giant turkey leg.

I feel the need to talk about this situation because John K is the reason I started this blog in the first place.  I, like many aspiring artists, was a big fan of the Ren & Stimpy show since it first came out way back in the early '90's.  The first time I had heard anything negative about him was during one of my first days of animation school.  In animation history class, when it came time to talk about the time period when Ren & Stimpy debuted, all the teacher said was, "John K is a jerk!" and left it at that.  Then, after that, I had joined a few online forums where animation is discussed.  There I found all sorts of praise for John as well as an equal amount of anger and vitriol.  I read all about that loud red-faced tantrums as well as, as one member of a forum posted, "John K lives like he's still in high school".
So then, around the start of 2006, I heard through the internet grapevine that John K himself was starting a blog where he could talk to his fans directly.  Almost immediately, I got myself a blogspot account and was on my way. I made my own blog posts where I had put up artwork of mine and I  commented on his posts.  One time he even made a comment on my little blog.



Oh, I fully admit that I was totally there doing that 'NOTICE ME SENPAI' thing trying to show him my art work and whatnot.  He did eventually weigh in on what he thought about my work's quality, and yeah he pretty much said I drew like a 10 year old.
Something like that is never pleasant to hear of course.  But, at the same time, I'm not going to let one man's opinion get me down. I know what my talents are and I plan to us them whenever I can.  Since that time I've worked on a few animated projects and have self published 2 comic books.
John and I butted heads at other times too, but it was about animation history mostly. I always countered his sycophantic compulsion to Bob Clampett's tall tales about himself with my researched facts (from other animation historians such as Michael Barrier).  I most certainly didn't discuss morality with him.  I think a discussion like that with the likes of him would have broken my brain.

Yes, it was quite evident that John K has a fetish.  I do remember seeing evidence on his blog of him flirting with young women still in or just freshly out of their teenage years and feeling a slight bit uncomfortable looking at that.  But, I just chalked that up to him being an "eccentric artist' and just minded my own business.
And, of course, much of his depravity naturally spilled out into Ren & Stimpy as well as any other projects he worked on.  One example that I found rather egregious was the ending of The Altruists, one of the Ren & Stimpy episodes that was on the Adult Cartoon Party on SpikeTV.



It ends with a police officer walking over to the main female character and fondling her breasts.  I'm not saying John shouldn't have done that. He and his crew are free to make any artistic decision they want.  All I'm saying is I personally would not have made that artistic decision. I believe he defended this by saying "it's a male fantasy. It's what every man wants to do to every sexy woman they see. I'm just providing that fantasy."  Y'see, I personally find just blatantly putting one's sexual fantasy into a story to be quite tacky whether it's written by a man or woman.  More often than not, a sexual nightmare or at least a 'less than ideal' sexual experience is much more endearing to an audience.

But at the same time, it's absolutely possible to separate the artist as a person from his/her body of work. John's influence over the entire animation industry has been immeasurable.  His work has inspired just as many people as it has nauseated.  There is no scandal large enough to take that achievement away from him.  Below I've embedded one of my favourite moments from one of Ren & Stimpy's best episodes just to give anyone unfamiliar with his work just a taste of what his animation legacy is about.



As lofty as John's achievements are, however, he's not to big to be held accountable for his actions and he's certainly not above receiving ridicule for said actions.  So, in that spirit, I'm posting my quick little satirical artwork aimed at Mr. K



Would John K himself consider this a well done drawing?  I don't entirely care at this point.

I will just end this blog post with one final message to John K.

Good sir, thank you for your tireless efforts to revive the exuberance and glory of the golden age of animation as well as your constant rebellion against the corporate executive tyranny that continues to suffocate the animation industry.  However, when it comes to your dysfunctional ways of dealing with human relations especially with young female artists, like the Michael Jordan meme says, 'Stop it!  Get some help!'


Oh, and I also wish a long healthy life filled with success for survivors Robyn Byrd and Katie Rice as well.

Wednesday, March 21, 2018

Count Dankula Did Nothing Wrong

Well, it's happened. Today, March 20, 2018, in Glasgow, Scotland, a man was actually taken to court and found guilty for............. well................ making this video:



A nice adorable little video about a man having fun with his girlfriend's dog.  I say that because that's exactly what this is, a man and a dog enjoying each other. Nothing more and nothing less.  At least rational people with a healthy sense of humour think so.  However, the police force in Scotland have a different (make bat shit stupid) idea about what humour is and so they had this Count Dankula fellow arrested and put on trial.  The website Medium has a good writeup on it. You can read about the details here.

Ok, I'm assuming you've read all that. Now you can read my take on it.  WOW! So much projection and paranoia.  These people actually thought this man and this dog could 'inspire anti-semitic violence' and possibly trigger World War III or some shit.  And is his real 'crime' being "grossly offensive"??? In a perfect world, the good Count would be receiving a Pulitzer or Nobel prize for being grossly offensive like that, not a fucking court sentence.
 When I usually post about some situation like this, I put up a picture of one or two of my Censor Monkeys that correspond with said situation like on this post and this post and sure this old post. But this time, fuck it. There's no reason to pick and choose this time.  I'm just putting up all of them.



Ok yeah, maybe the Scientologist Monkey doesn't apply here. But then again I'm not completely ruling him out just yet.

As anyone can see this is a bloody farce of a circus of a trial going on here.  There wasn't even a jury of Dankula's peers. Just the Sheriff Derek O'Carroll being judge, jury, and you can bet he wanted to be the executioner if the courts would let him.  Since nobody was allowed to record anything at the trial we can only comment on first hand accounts from the people who sat in the gallery.  One such person is a controversial figure in the UK named Tommy Robinson.  He's been fighting so much against the forces of censorship pushing their weight around in the UK.  As of a few days ago, he won a victory for free speech by giving a speech at a place called Speaker's Corner,  a speech that another man had been arrested for and banned from the UK for trying to make.  Anyway, here's Tommy talking about what he saw happen when the verdict was read.

Sorry, this is a video on Bitchute and I couldn't find how to embed a Bitchute video on to this site.  So, to see the video you have to click this text as a link.

Did you hear what Tommy said at the end there? The sheriff/judge was just making an example of this Youtuber in the name of "diversity".  I believe the statement the judge made was "we live in a multicultural society now".

Ok.

Two things about that.

one: THIS HAS ALWAYS BEEN A MULTICULTURAL SOCIETY, YOU TOTAL FUCKING IDIOT!!! All of these various races of humans didn't materialize out of thin air. Every race we can see has been on the planet since as far back as humans can remember.  This is not anything new.

aaaaaaaaaaand two:  Do you, Sheriff Derek O'Carroll, actually possess the arrogance, the self righteous platitude and yes even the racial superiority to suggest that every single non-white person agrees with you on this verdict???  Are you really so goddamn full of yourself that you've actually developed a big enough saviour complex that you truly and sincerely think that you're helping every single marginalized minority member by rendering this censorious, authoritarian, and frankly anti-justice verdict???  Really, thinking this way is far more racist, condescending and yes even more dangerous than Count Dankula's video could ever be.  That's a similar mindset to say and 'old fashioned' man saying "Uh oh, guys. Stop telling all of them 'titty jokes'. There's ladies present."  Any self respecting woman would slap the face of any man using such condescension and rightfully so.  No one group is  a monolith that all feels the same way on every issue.
As proof of this, I've embedded the testimony of one minority member on his opinion of this verdict below.



That's one anyway.  If there are others let me know.  Better still, whatever race and/or gender you happen to be, feel free to leave a comment down below giving your opinion of this case's verdict.  Let people know that this miscarriage of justice (or more appropriately '3rd trimester abortion of justice') can not and should not stand.

But, as of now, the sentence has been delivered. The good Count and the rest of us can only wait one whole month for his punishment to be handed down.  I'm hoping it will be just a thorough spanking from a arbiter of his choosing.

"We'll do it!"

"Us too!"
That probably won't be it. But, we can still dream.

I'll end this blog with a musical number that would absolutely raise the ire of that Scottish courtroom. It's a clip from one of the greatest movies made by one of the best nazi-mockers of all time: Mel Brooks.  Enjoy it while you still can.