Less politics on Fleen, please. Whatever your politics, remember that if you write anything political, you make half your readership very tired indeed.

By cyberpunks on 01.25.06 7:44 am

I agree, my editorializing was maybe a little off-topic. Except that I was discussing what the current strip was about.

But the only other “political” stuff in Fleen, that I know of, is a mention that Belphegor contains a lot of left-wing politics. Which would seem a service to the reader – so they aren’t surprised.

So… okay – you didn’t like it, I understand. But “less” is going to be hard. We’re certainly not going to ignore comics that are blatantly political, just to avoid offending readers who might disagree with those politics.

By Jeff Lowrey on 01.25.06 7:59 am

Within the realms of politicizing…

1) Lots of people do know what it means to “Support Our Troops,” (or at least they have good working definitions for themselves) and many ARE writing their congresspeople to that effect.

2) The strip in question nicely points out that a lot of people do NOT know, and using the humorists’ tool “exaggeration” demonstrates that this poses problems here at home.

Jeff, your commentary indicates that either you yourself do not know, and believe that nobody does, or that you are trying to be funny by employing the same exaggeration employed in the strip in question.

Either way, that first paragraph of commentary comes off quite weak while the comic itself is funny, and as Cyberpunks has pointed out, it colors the whole article, making it less likely that it will be read in the tone you intended.

–Howard

By Howard Tayler on 01.25.06 9:32 am

Cyberpunks: I’ll say what Jeff was too polite to say: Fleen is our soapbox. We write what we want, in whatever context we feel like writing it. If you find it tiresome, there is a simple solution: don’t read it. Problem solved.

You can tell us our premise is flawed or our execution weak (as Howard did), but you don’t get to say, “Don’t write that” because you don’t pay us. Hell, Jon doesn’t get to say, “Don’t write that”, and he does pay us (in beer).

And if you think that it’s really that important to editorialize what should/should not be written here, you are welcome to submit writing samples and try to become a contributor, at which time Jon will buy you beer and you can be free to not write about politics all you want.

By Gary Tyrrell on 01.25.06 11:06 am

I did not say, “Don’t write that”. I said please. And I gave a reason why mentioning politics is a bad idea.

For example, one of my favorite writers is of an entirely opposite political alignment than myself, and quite extreme at that, and yet, when I read his weblog, he never once mentions his politics. As a point of pride.

Because he has an interest in people reading what he writes. And so do you, otherwise you would not be writing for free.

(Btw, thanks, Jeff, for the polite answer)

By cyberpunks on 01.26.06 2:01 am

We aren’t writing for free. And even if we were, so what? If we have an interest in people reading what we write, then what’s the point of limiting what we write out of fear that somebody won’t read us?

Restricting yourself to producing only that which displeases nobody does not equal pleasing anybody. And it leads directly to Garfield, weakly-hopped national mega-brew “pilsners”, and The Olive Garden. No, thank you.

By Gary Tyrrell on 01.26.06 12:31 pm

[…] Mostly, Fleen would like to thank founding contributor Jeff Lowrey for his posts to date. Circumstances dictate that Jeff start running in Deep Cover mode for a while, but we hope to see him pop up from time to time and lay some prime webcomics commentary on us. Or phat beats, whichever works for you. Jeff’s posting privileges will remain in good standing as long as there is a Fleen, except in the unlikely case of a conviction. We salute you Jeff, our very own Man of Mystery. […]

By Fleen: Written by bitter, haggard wordbeasts » Miscellaneous Items Of Note on 08.06.06 5:27 pm