I rarely offend PEOPLE in my blog or comic strip. But I often offend OTHER people. By that I mean that for 18 years I have been getting the following sort of e-mail, and now blog comment:
“Mr. Adams – Your (blog or comic) today was highly offensive to ambidextrous Rotarians! By portraying one ambidextrous Rotarian as lazy you are declaring it okay to mock ambidextrous Rotarians. They already have a tough time in society. Would you say the same thing about African Americans or Jews?”
But that’s not the interesting part. The letters virtually always include this parenthetical: “(By the way, I am not myself an ambidextrous Rotarian, but I know someone who is.)”
When I get that sort of complaint I watch my e-mail to see if any actual ambidextrous Rotarians also write. Sure enough, I will start seeing e-mail from them too. The lag is about a day because their friends forward my comic or blog to them. Those letters fall into two categories:
1. “Perhaps I can help explain how wonderful the ambidextrous Rotarians are so you can say something nice in the future about our goodness.”
2. “How can I buy a copy of that comic for my wall?”
But no ambidextrous Rotarian will complain that he was PERSONALLY offended. This is one of those good news/bad news things about humanity. On the plus side, it’s wonderful to know that virtually everyone has a good sense of humor about himself. I could pick your name out of a phone book, then draw a comic with you as a character with the punchline “George Phtbucnjak is a baby-eater”, assuming that’s your name, and you would laugh. You’d probably ask for a signed copy.
On the negative side, some ass-pimple is going to take time out from contributing to the GNP or spending time with his family to write me a long angry note about how I have offended him on behalf of whatever-the-hell ethnic group George belongs to. “I am not a half-Tibetan, half-Lithuanian baby-eater but I know people who are! If you had a brain you’d know they can’t help themselves.”
To be fair, I have offended a few actual people too. But it’s rare. For example, when Asok the intern first appeared I got angry letters from African Americans who were personally offended that I portrayed the “only black character” in my strip as being naïve and abused in the office. They threatened to complain to the newspapers and get me kicked out. I could have responded that being naïve and abused is an intern’s job description, so it’s not really an insult. But I went with the more direct defense that Asok isn’t African American. He’s Indian. And how do you think my correspondents responded to that information?
“You should add an African American to the comic.”
[Update: Now that many of you have already made the same joke about how I offended ass-pimples or whiners or ambidextrous Rotarians, your addition — even with a new category — will not be deemed witty.]