HENN: Fear and loathing in 1Kartunistan

Technorati tags: HENN, Humor, Cartoons, Cartoonaphobia

Editorial: Fear & Loathing in 1Kartunistan 
myAsylum presents an editorial piece written by 1Kartunistan’s leading cartoon  rights activist G. Kaca - reporting straight from Hell, and soon-to-be Hell-on-Earth, Malaysia. Another episode in the continuing series from the Hell-on-Earth News Network (HENN)

1Kartunistan woke up yesterday morning with its usual enthusiasm for another cartoonish day. Like any other cartoonish day, we thought. Instead, we were shocked to find out that the government of 1Kartunistan wants to propose a licensing bill that may one day make satire, parody and humor capital crimes.

You may or may not know me – my name is G. Kaca. My uber-sexy soul mate, Dewilicious, and I were featured in a short-lived series of cartoons entitled Kaca’s Eyes.

Short-lived, because our creator, Walski69, was too damned lazy to continue with telling our stories and observations. He’ll probably claim otherwise, if asked, but that’s another fable for another time. 

Regardless, this editorial is not about our dumbass creator. It is about bigger and more critical issues. The government of 1Kartunistan has indicated that it wants to license humor. Will this be the first baby steps in the process of eradicating humor from our lives altogether?

Of late, not a single day passes without something strange and distressing happening in 1Kartunistan. Take for example the brutal slayings, strange accidents, and the National Alphabet Soup Campaign launched the other day. Do you think that all these would be easily acceptable if we didn’t have a sense of humor? Worse, it’s soup that you can’t even eat! Ha ha.

See? It takes humor to make life palatable. Same goes with alphabet soup. But sadly, it seems that they now want to take it away. Or at least legislate and license it to the point of not being funny anymore. Sigh…  
(let humor reign free, and more, in the full post)

Whether the authorities want to admit it or not, humor – be it in the form of satire, parody or even silly Scenario-style slapstick – adds another dimension to our otherwise 2-dimensional existence. Granted there are 3D cartoons, but these are, in fact, heretical pop ups. We were drawn in 2D, and that’s the existence that our creators have deemed fit to have us remain.

But I digress.

The point is, take away the added dimension of humor, and all we’ll be left with is the drabness of Senyum Kambing, otherwise known as the “lame incumbents” here in 1Kartunistan. It is the worst imaginable aspect of being 2-dimensional – drab and boring. Is that what we will be doomed to become if the proposed legislation goes through – terminally 2-dimensional and totally devoid of humor?

Are we to take these proposals lying down? Of course we are – we hate pop-up cartoons, as I’ve already mentioned. But in our 2D capacity, lying down, we must speak up. Speak up so loudly that we seem 3-dimensional. That last sentence does sound a little delusional, but that’s what we’ve been driven to become.

So depressing is the state of 1Kartunistan that it has forced a cartoon character to write an editorial, who, try as hard as he may to sound funny, can’t. It doesn’t get more 2-delusional than this, folks.

Just think of the ramifications, if this anti-humor licensing legislation goes through. We may one day be required to have permits to smile, **smirk**, **giggle**. That would be akin to requiring a permit for humans to breathe, which as cartoons, we fortunately don’t have to.

Worse, is the self-loathing of the 1Kartunistan powers that be – do we hate ourselves so much that we wish to legislate (and possibly eradicate) the one characteristic that makes us cartoons?

To the uninitiated, or human, it would almost seem that we, as a cartoon nation, have been gripped by a kind of cartoonaphobia. Fear of cartoons, which, in the context of 1Kartunistan, translates to fear of ourselves. And of our own shadows. Boo!

The last straw was the incarceration of a creator a few days ago. The reason? Well, quite honestly, we don’t have a clue. But 1Kartunistan having become what it is, we can only guess it’s self-loathing and irrational fear. Cartoonaphobia, in other words.

Dewilicious and I would therefore like to make a stand. While lying down and being 2-dimensional, of course. And that stand is to remain funny, sarcastic, parody-ish, and any qualities that make us naturally funny as cartoons.

Legislating humor is against cartoon nature. Let this be a warning to the 1Kartunistan powers that be – we, her cartoon citizens, refuse to have our inalienable rights to be funny be curtailed in any way, shape or form.

Allow us to be naturally funny unencumbered, or risk a revolt. And that revolt will be in the form of us cartoons to be revoltingly funny. A revolting revolt. So funny, we’ll all die laughing. Mwahahahahahah…

Funny? No, we don’t think so either.
(© 2010 - Hell-on-Earth News Network)

DISCLAIMER: Views expressed in this editorial are strictly those of the editorialist, and may not reflect those of HENN, nor of any personnel related to Hell-on-Earth-News Network, unless otherwise prescribed by a qualified physician or veterinarian. HENN does not endorse, nor disapprove, any opinions expressed in this publication. No animals, living, dead or undead, were harmed in the construction of this article.