Re: OT: Dogbert's New Ruling Class Newsletter, April, 2005

"Scott Stephens" <scottxs@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:ur6dnduz3pLTAMPfRVn-sw@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Kryten wrote:
>
>> Its a cartoon, it is meant to be laughable, not taken seriously.
>
> Art is an expression of world-view, conceptual frame-work, sense-of-life.
> Art sends a message.

Well, maybe at the top end. Picasso's "Guernica" for instance was full of
symbolism and meaning about the fascist bombing of a civilian target.

Dilbert cartoons are as lightweight as you can get, they get produced at a
rate of one per day.

It's not high art, any more than Mike Myers is Shakespeare.

> Adams art tells you life is a sick joke.

Most well adjusted individuals just take it as a simple amusing cartoon to
make them smile or laugh. Really - people buy his work to make them happy.

>> It does highlight and mock stupidity.
>
> More than stupidity, it mocks individualism and creativity.

Dilbert is a nice intelligent guy who is honest, hardworking, creative, and
technically savvy. He's the one most of the audience identify with.

The cartoon doesn't mock him, in fact he stands by his own standards of good
behaviour despite being surrounded by less decent people.

It mocks incompetent bosses who pay more attention to playing the boss than
to understanding the product they sell. It mocks staff who avoid work
(Wally).

> What was it that made planets "unstable"?

The movie never said. It's just a movie plot device, to provide a reason for
a bunch of guys to be stuck in a tiny spaceship in the middle of nowhere for
ages.


> Not the first sci-fi to feature nihilistic militant aliens.

It only featured one alien that they had picked up as a pet.
It was so low budget it was no more than a beach ball.

Maybe it was nihilistic and militant, but it seemed more like a dumb dog.



> Everywhere people are looking to their peers to define their values, and
> asking others to pay for their good intentions.

I'd never noticed.

>> You're paranoid.
>
> If I am, it still doesn't prove their all not out to get me!

Right. Maybe you are the centre of an entire universe is totally focused on
pissing you off.
Maybe you are that important. Maybe every shitty thing that happened in your
life is someone else's fault, and deliberate. If it's not your parents, it's
your classmates, or your teachers, or your boss, or people who are
everywhere messing things up behind the scenes. Yes, the world's biggest
capitalist democracy is just riddled with commie bastards.

On the other hand, maybe none of this is true. Maybe the universe doesn't
give a *** about anyone, maybe you're just born without a sense of humour
or the ability to get along with normal well adjusted people. Maybe you just
can't take a humorous post for what it is, a joke. Maybe if some caring
person takes the time to tell you to seek some help, you see them as someone
wanting you to get chemically lobotomised.

Well, gee, I think the simpler explanation is the more likely.

> Egomaniacal fascists contrast altruistic nihilists like Adams. Ayn Rands
> egoism is a bit more tame and civilized, but it was inspired by Nietzsche,
> so he should get the credit.

Ayn Rands' writing is so head-up-its-ass that it was ridiculed on South
Park.
Officer Barbrady learned to read, read "Atlas Shrugged", and declared it
such a piece of *** he vowed never to read another book again.

Or are you going to tell us that this cartoon is full of evil messages to
turn us into child-buggering commie bastards?

Really dude, you need to lighten up.



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