Dave Sim's blogandmail #205 (April 4th, 2007)

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Fifteen Impossible Things to Believe Before Breakfast That Make You a Good Feminist

1. A mother who works a full-time job and delegates to strangers the raising of her children eight hours a day, five days a week does just as good a job as a mother who hand-rears her children full time.

2. It makes great sense for the government to pay 10 to 15,000 dollars a year to fund a daycare space for a child so its mother - who pays perhaps 2,000 dollars in taxes - can be a contributing member of society.

3. A woman's doctor has more of a valid claim to participate in the decision to abort a fetus than does the father of that fetus.

4. So long as a woman makes a decision after consulting with her doctor, she is incapable of making an unethical choice.

5. A car with two steering wheels, two gas pedals and two brakes drives more efficiently than a car with one steering wheel, one gas pedal and one brake which is why marriage should always be an equal partnership.

6. It is absolutely necessary for women to be allowed to join or participate fully in any gathering place for men, just as it is absolutely necessary that there be women only environments from which men are excluded.

7. Because it involves taking jobs away from men and giving them to women, affirmative action makes for a fairer and more just society.

8. It is important to have lower physical standards for women firepersons and women policepersons so that, one day, half of all firepersons and policepersons will be women, thus more effectively protecting the safety of the public.

9. Affirmative action at colleges and universities needs to be maintained now that more women than men are being enrolled, in order to keep from giving men an unfair advantage academically.

10. Having ensured that there is no environment for men where women don't belong (see no.6) it is important to have zero tolerance of any expression or action which any woman might regard as sexist to ensure greater freedom for everyone.

11. Only in a society which maintains a level of 95% of alimony and child support being paid by men to women can men and women be considered as equals.

12. An airline stewardess who earned $20,000 a year at the time that she married a baseball player earning $6 million a year is entitled, in the event of a divorce, to $3 million for each year of the marriage and probably more.

13. A man's opinions on how to rear and/or raise a child are invalid because he is not the child's mother. However, his financial obligation is greater because no woman gets pregnant by herself.

14. Disagreeing with any of these statements makes you anti-woman and/or a misogynist.

15. Legislature Seats must be allocated to women and women must be allowed to bypass the democratic winnowing process in order to guarantee female representation and, thereby, make democracy fairer.

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BEGINNING HERE AND

THROUGH UNTIL FRIDAY

(SATURDAY TOPS)

MORE MATT DOW THAN YOU COULD

POSSIBLY KNOW WHAT TO DO WITH!

Hi Mr. Dave!

Hi, Matt. Welcome to the Blog & Mail and…uh…something wrong?

Sorry, had a momentary flashback to my childhood. Mr. Bill was the guy who delivered bottles to the liquor store next door when I was young. Strangely, the liquor store is now the local St. Vincent de Paul store.

As with almost everything you say, I'm not really sure how to take that. So, what have you got there?

Anywoo, the latest and greatest package I've sent you yet.

Anywoo?

Whatcha getting:

(anywoo?)

A reprint of Amazing Fantasy #15! (crowd noises: ANYWOO! ANYWAA!)

Now you've got them doing it.

Yeah, I know "The Origin of Spider-Man", you've seen it a hundred times. But, this isn't just that, it's a reprint of (nearly) the whole issue. The "special message from the editor" advertised on the cover is missing, and all the ads are updates. It's from this Spider-Man action figure I got. (waiting for me to say something)

Which is where the Dr. Strange comic I sent last time came from. Look on the back cover. See the ad for the "Build Your Own Galactus"? Yeah, let's just say I built my own Galactus. (waiting for me to say something)

You look as if you're waiting for me to say something [crowd laughs]

All four stories are by Lee/Ditko. I thought the second one, "The Bell Ringer", was an odd story for where and when it first appeared. I figured a Ditko fan like you would enjoy it (er, the comic, not the second story. I figured a God-fearing man like you would enjoy that.)

Well, you've got that right. Thanks to the miracle of the Blog & Mail Time Lapse Cam I was able to read it while you were on your way over from the hotel (Guests of the Blog & Mail stay at the Fabulous Luddite Arms Hotel in beautiful Downtown Kitchener. The Luddite Arms where smashing advanced technology out of profound ignorance isn't just a way of life, it's a life STYLE!). They're like salted nuts those old Lee/Ditko short stories. Blake Bell sent me a bunch that didn't make the cut for his Ditko book coming out next year from Fantagraphics.

The DC Millennium edition of Mysterious Suspense #1 (crowd noises: ANYWOO! ANYWAA!)

Oh, stop that.

The Question's solo debut. Another Ditko fan favorite (I hope.) I remember not liking it when I first got it, but upon rereading it now, I find it quite enjoyable. But the lettering is awful.

I had not read this before. (tapping my pencil and trying to look like Johnny Carson) (Matt just stares at me. I think he's too young to know who Johnny Carson is) Yeah, it's that machine lettering that Ditko used on some of his self-published stuff and that they used for a lot of Charlton stuff. You can really see Mr. A isn't too far off. When did it originally come out? 1968 it says here. I was twelve at the time. And you were…?

(ignoring me) The DC Millennium edition of Brave And The Bold #85. This was next to Mysterious Suspense in my longboxes, and I only pulled it out to read, when I read the introductory text piece. "Neal Adams for Dave?" Sure, why not?

Actually I bought Brave & Bold #85 off the newsstands and I still have my original copy. "The Senator's Been Shot!" 1969. There was a real frisson of horror reading a comic book called "The Senator's Been Shot" the year after Bobby Kennedy was killed. Can they DO this? The great shot on the second last page of Bruce Wayne bursting into the Senate to cast the deciding vote with his skinny Kennedy-style tie and tailored Kennedy-style dark suit. Yeah, Neal knew what we wanted to see long before we did.

Enjoy!

Thanks, Matt. What else have you got there?

And let's see: The Complete as-far-as-I-know-so-don't-blame-me-if-I-missed-something-I-did-a lot-of-crap-drawings-back-in-the-day Boner The Runt Dog (With creator commentary!). Basically all the stuff I showed you and Ger in Utah. (putting them up on the Blog & Mail monitors in the studio) With a commentary where I translate all the strips into English. Also where I explain any joke that I think only I get. Hey! Maybe I'll make some more of these up and sell them at SPACE.

(no reaction from the crowd) Or, not. (crowd laughs) And, the strip I remember you laughing at the most, recreated just for you.

Yeah, this is the one. "Get away from me, skank" (laughing again and theatrically stuffing it down the front of my shirt). I still want to use it in the screenplay to I don't want anyone else getting a good look at it.

I think this is the one Ger laughed at too that you mentioned in a recent-ish Blogandmail. If not, let me know which one Ger enjoyed the most, and I'll send up a recreation of that too.

Oh, in a recent Bloggy Mail…

BLOGGY mail?

…you asked me to post a copy of the picture of you and Ger, and Mimi, and Jason Trimmer. Well, I can't. I just "pusheded" the button. It was Jason's camera. But here's a drawing of what I remember the picture looking like when I took it. Speaking of the Bloggy Mails.

Wait a minute, wait a minute. BLOGGY mails?!

On 1/12/07, Dave Sim wrote:

Friday January 12 –

LATTER DAYS (AUGO31920)

No. I quite agree. There is no way to write a song parody about AUGO31920 unless there was a theme song to Beverly Hills 90210 with lyrics. Actually, I bet Matt Dow could do it.

To which I done replied:Whoa! Whoa! Let's save that one for tomorrow. Come on back tomorrow for Matt Dow's singing debut. (looking at Matt). BLOGGY MAILS?

THERE'S MORE FOR YOU

IN TODAY'S BLOGGY MAILS!

Now cut that out!

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REPLIES POSTED ON THE CEREBUS YAHOO! GROUP
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