August 31, 2010

Comic Art Propaganda: A Graphic History

Photo: Courtesy St. Martin's Griffin (4)

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Yes, the US military really did produce a cartoon instructional manual about Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. And the American government is by no means the only entity to use cartoons in humorless way.

Indeed, if you’re going to shove your political agenda down people’s throats, there may be no more entertaining method than comics. Which is precisely why Comic Art Propaganda: A Graphic History is so inviting and unnerving. In this collection of cartoon agitprop, Fredrik Strömberg, a Swedish comics expert, surveys everything from evangelical Archie strips and hysterical Cold War fantasies to ’70s feminist comics and 9/11 kitsch. Much of the material is laughable, but artifacts like legendary cartoonist Milt Caniff’s wartime pamphlet “How to Spot a Jap” remain vivid illustrations of comics’ inflammatory potential.

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WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

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Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

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Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

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