Category Archives: cartoons

cartoons

Everyday Hugs

The below images are part of an ongoing cartooning project called Everyday Hugs. You can find updated illustrations at http://instagram.com/everyday_hugs

A well-crafted 30-Day Challenge (set yourself a daily goal and stick to it for a month) can be a powerful life-improvement tools. They are how I started flossing daily, started making the bed every morning, stopped biting my nails, and ended the vicious alarm-snooze-alarm-snooze cycle.

The past 30 days were devoted to improving my illustration skills by drawing at least one cartoon per day. To reduce decision fatigue, they were all to be of the same subject — you guessed it!— Hugs. It seemed like an easy enough goal, but between working and parenting a toddler, the challenge lived up its name.

The above images are the uncomplicated, unsophisticated, and relatively unprofessional result. But I don’t think they are unimportant, especially in our current historical moment.

You’ll notice that I chose to omit certain things. There are no phones, no internet, no pandemic, no masks nor social distancing, no guns nor violence. Yet these people are not living in utopia. They aren’t all happy.

These thirty cartoons are a purely selfish project, which means their outward message may be limited. But I was, in fact, trying to say something. And as with any message you try to convey, the question is alway: How many times must it be repeated before it’s heard? How many more until it’s understood? How many more beyond that until it’s lost once again? For every listener there is a different voice; for every voice there is a different threshold.

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cartoons

Social Media Hydra

! This claim about election fraud is disputed

— Twitter

Social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook are taking action to reduce misinformation (or “information” depending on your preferred bias). But it’s become a game of whack-a-mole with new entrants flooding the market to capture “free speech” advocates. Sites such as Parler, MeWe, and Gab have gained popularity with the ‘Stop the Steal’ movement, which seeks alternative echo chambers. And despite regulators’ best efforts, this trend is unlikely to reverse anytime soon—cut one platform down, and two grow back in it’s place.

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cartoons

Opposite World

opposite world (again)

Do you have any preconceived notions that you clearly know are unfounded? How does our culture decide what “matters” and what doesn’t? And most importantly, is a male ballet dancer actually called a “ballerino”?

In a different universe, under different circumstances, ballet is the rule-breaking pastime of rebellious youth, and skateboarding is the respectable practice of a well-mannered, cultured aristocracy. At the highest levels, both activities require finesse, nuance, and the potential for artistic expression. Each can have a soft touch or emotional vigor, be smooth and graceful or forceful and punchy. The difference is our historical expectations—highbrow artists vs. lowbrow rebels. What if their roles were reversed?

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cartoons

The Modern Woman

PrioritiesWhat’s do you see? What comes to mind when looking at the image above? Is it a celebration of the modern woman’s accomplishments—breaking down gender barriers while juggling life’s many tasks? Or perhaps it’s an example of mansplaining—a message from yet another male critic of the “feminist agenda”? Does the image endorse multitasking or condemn it? Liberal or conservative? Sexist or feminist? An attack on contemporary activism, consumerism, and technology or a recognition of the modern world?

Yep.

Last week the New Zealand prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, announced that she was pregnant. Her first child will be born during her first year in office. News outlets had a field day. Social media immediately flooded with opinions. And I… well… I drew a cartoon.

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cartoons

Diversity

diversity

This is not an essay. I started writing an essay; it was on cultural differences, what makes us the same or different, the difficulty of defining ethnicity/diversity/race/culture and how they relate to conflict, Freud’s “narcissism of minor differences,” the American melting pot, and various other ideas along those lines. But with so much written on these topics, they are still ambiguous concepts that change with time. Rather than failing to convey my thoughts clearly with an essay, I’ve elected for a simple cartoon—a three panel summary.

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