Looking back on the almost two years of Covidmania, I can proudly say that I was snookered for only a short time by the scam. By March 19, 2020, I became a skeptic and stayed a skeptic… how? I don’t consider myself a “good person”. I consider myself a “bad person”. Let me explain.
If you’ve read Mark Twain’s novel “Huckleberry Finn” you may recall that Huck considered himself a bad person and not “sivilized”. Because Huck thought of himself as a bad person who did bad things, he did the absolute worst thing any person could do in the Antebellum South… he helped a slave escape to freedom.
Being “good” means conforming to the prevailing group-think no matter if it made sense or not. Being “bad” means making your own decisions regardless of what other people think. When we were bombarded in 2020 with propaganda telling us to “social distance” and wear masks, the message always stressed the supposed altruistic goal of those useless, theatrical acts. – “do it for others”. To defy or even question the “virtue signaling” was considered selfish and rude. Many people got bogged down trying to figure it out. I didn’t because I’m “bad” and out of habit, I just resist doing what “good” people tell me I have to do.
Then the public appeals to “be good” failed to convince everyone. The authoritarians shifted to brutal mandates and edicts. That is when compliant, virtuous Americans became “Good Germans”. They failed the Milgram experiment. Fear of being shunned by other “good” people suppressed their ability to reason. Without the ability to reason, their inner demons took control and the “Good People” did bad things… very bad things. And now the “good” people who did bad things want us to forgive them. I have no obligation to forgive them because forgiveness is not expected of “bad people” like me.
This preoccupation with being “good” has made mush out of American culture. American novels, films, comics and songs used to have “anti-heroes”. A good example is Humphrey Bogart’s character “Rick” in the 1942 film “Casablanca”. Rick runs a saloon with a gambling den in a back room. Rick does not consider himself a “good” person. When Rick is asked about his nationality, he replies, “I’m a drunkard”. By the end of the film (spoiler alert) Rick, the anti-hero becomes the hero, a bad guy who does something good. The important part of that “character arc” is that Rick uses his skills and reputation as a bad person, to deceive the authorities in order to help the Resistance character, Victor Lazlo to escape to America.
Where are the anti-heroes in the Covidmania story? Where are the books, graphic novels, plays, films about non-compliant, oppositional bad guys and gals resisting the conformity of goodness?
Well, I’m doing my part with UNJABBBED… speaking of… I’m nearly done working on Episode 6. It’s full of badass stuff like guns and battle scenes. Badass drawings take time to draw, so hang in there, stay tuned and thank you for being patient.
Hi Ken, I am an artist but not a cartoonist so I must be just a very bad person.
Thanks for all you do! I can imagine it's very time consuming and also very cathartic and rewarding.
This is such an important point & distinction to make. But it isn’t being made anywhere in popular culture. It is about character, and the real epidemic in the US (and Europe) is a nearly complete loss of strong inner character, which is by its nature complex, multi-variegated and difficult to deceive. It isn’t “good” in any conventional sense. Thank you.