My Censor Monkeys Are Animated

It's finally happened!  I have put my Censor Monkey characters to animation.  Don't worry if this scene doesn't make sense yet.  It's a very small part of a larger video I'm working on.  There will be some other action going on in those two empty seats in the front row.

Looking at this you're probably asking many questions. "Why have they all gathered in this movie theatre?" "Why film are they watching?" "What could they be seeing that is making them all so mad?"

Well, the answer to the last question is: Everything! Everything they see makes them mad.  A little spoiler there I guess.  Anyway, I made this thing and it is what it is.  Feedback is always welcome. 

 

Bill C-11 just became law in Canada. Get ready, folks!

 That's right.  As of April 28 of this year, the highly controversial Bill C-11 passed in the senate and became law.  Some are saying it's "great for Canadian culture" while others decry it as "the ultimate censorship tool".  "Which of those is it", you ask.  Well, let's talk about it here.

The pro-C11 side say that this new law is simply about boosting truly Canadian content on the internet including social media sites.  A noble goal indeed, but severely flawed from the outset.  Government meddling in entertainment and news media is NEVER a good thing.  At the animation school I attended, one of our teachers grew up in Soviet occupied Ukraine.  She told us that the only thing available on Soviet television was ballet.

this or nothing

In the USSR, the only shows you could watch on TV were ballet or nothing.  This was the country's government colluding with entertainment and blatantly telling the entire populous that "THIS is what our culture is".

I'm not saying this amount of suppression is happening here in Canada already.  There's certainly still a wide variety of shows and news available to Canadians made here and around the world.  Here's hoping it stays that way no matter what the government does.

This idea of presenting a "Canadian identity" on our airwaves is certainly nothing new.  It's a debate going back decades and decades.  For instance, back in the day when "Justin's dad" was the Prime Minister, there was a Canadian made show
called SCTV.  The "SC" stood for Second City.  The show was pretty much the main stage cast of the Toronto affiliate of Second City producing a TV show the same way they would create their sketches for the live stage.  After their first season, they were shopping their show around to various TV stations in order to attract a wider audience.  When they made their pitch to a station manager in Edmonton, they got some rather back-handed feedback.  "Your show is not Canadian enough", he said.  They didn't appreciate that assessment.  "We're already using Canadian actors, writers, producers and facilities.  What more do you want us to do? You want us to sit in front of a big map of Canada, wear toques and drink beer?"  That was their response. 

Well, the guy said "make it more Canadian" so that's what they did.  This is what brought about the MacKenzie Brothers.  Everyone in Canada (definitely those over 40) are all too familiar with these characters.  But, for those who aren't, I'll post a video below:

Watching this skit all those years, did you ever wonder why they had that long scroll at the end of their first few shows?  Well, that was their rebellion against the CRTC's guidelines of what constitutes "Canadian content" and against that weird jerky guy in Edmonton.  "Is THIS Canadian enough for you, hosers??!!"

Of course, now with Bill C-11 in place, it's not just "some guy in Edmonton" whose pushing for "a more Canadian feel" to this country's content, it's the current Prime Minister doing it.  He won't physically be in the writing room telling Canadian productions what to do and what not to do, which is how it should ALWAYS be.  However, he will have his finger on the algorithm that will determine what productions get artificially boosted online and which ones don't.  And the standards for which he and his cabinet will use to ascertain which productions will be boosted or not are................................... well, he's not saying so far. Whether Justin claims to make these decisions fairly or not, I will talk about a time not so long ago about another Prime Minister with a similar type of ambition.

That Prime Minister's name was Stephen Harper.  About 15 or so years ago, the Bill C-11 was known as Bill C-10.  PM Harper wanted to pass that bill so that, as Conservatives put it at the time,

"tax dollars should not be funding productions that some Canadians find objectionable".  I talked about much of that controversy here on this blog back in the day.  Here is an interview the CBC did about that topic back in the day.  I find it rather odd that many of the same people who were up in arms about Harper passing this bill are today all uproariously happy with Trudeau passing the exact same bill.  Of course, at the same time, some people who are outraged about the bill paying under Trudeau were hoping for Harper to pass it back in 2008.  I, for one, want NEITHER of these sides in charge of Canadian productions and I want both of them far FAR FAAAAAAAAAR away from any kind of social media regulation.  If the next Prime Minister to get in after Justin does not immediately take Bill C-11 and journey to Mordor to cast it the fiery lakes from which it was forged, that Prime Minister should receive a non-confidence vote instantly and then replaced by someone that WILL make that journey.  

No, master. You no takes my precious bill away.  I use bill responsibly. You see.

Well, ok Minister of....... Stuff.  Just don't let the bill be handled by any of these guys:

But, for now, the bill is now here and is not going anywhere any time soon.  But, I haven't given up hope in any way.  As with the example of SCTV I showed earlier, there's always rebellion to fall back on.  Anyone who's truly creative enough can find ways around draconian government rules no matter how many of those rules the government chooses to make.  Freedom always finds a way.

I'll end this post with a video from one of the best group of sketch comedians in Canada or anywhere else in the world: the Kids in the Hall.  I've embedded below one of their sketches that would surely challenge any rules that any Canadian government can dish out, even 30 years later.  Enjoy, and also, screw you. :P 

So, take off, eh!

Victor Orban is a paranoid censorious twat-waffle jackass

 

Yeah, I don't like him at all.  Not one little bit.  Yes, that same Victor Orban that is the current leader of Hungary, I have a rather low opinion of this man.  I've never met his guts, but if I did I'm sure I'd hate them too.

And yet, there is a faction of people in the USA that laud this guy as a "saviour of the west" of some sort.  Last year, Tucker Carlson himself actually traveled to Budapest to have a sit down interview with this guy.

Ok.  That was a nice little ego stroking session there.

By the way, my beef with Victor is not simply because he's "right wing".  His politics are his politics and he's entitled to them.  My big problem with him has to do with how he treats the play/movie Billy Elliot.

He's actually banned this work from the entire country of Hungary because................... get this............ he's afraid it might inspire people to become gay.  He seriously thinks that.

When I first heard about Mr. Orban's objection, I had only heard of Billy Elliot.  I hadn't actually seen it at all.  So, I couldn't fully comment on what Victor was going on about.  But, I recently saw it so now I can make a much more informed statement about the whole thing.  For those who haven't seen it, I'll give a brief synopsis here:

Billy Elliot starts off the movie doing his boxing lessons.  But, quickly realizes that he's not so good at it.

However, he notices that in another part of the gymnasium there's a ballet class going on.  Billy can't quite explain, but something draws him toward that class and inspires him to get into dancing.....

...much to the red-faced disappointment of his gruff coal-mining father.

But don't fret because... SPOILER... his father does come around to supporting Billy and his desire to dance.  It's quite a well executed transformation on the father's part in my opinion.

But, Billy "dancing like a pouf (as many characters in the show call it)" is not the LBGTQ element that Victor Orban and his ilk are concerned about.

A small side story is Billy's friend who's gotten into cross-dressing.  He raids his sister's closet and tries on all the dresses of hers that he likes.  Billy's immediate reaction is to be taken aback and say "what are you doing?".  But, Billy's supportive nature quickly kicks in and he's very happy with his friend discovering himself.

Billy's so supportive that he even gives his friend a kiss.  That's his way of telling his friend that he'd make a very lovely woman someday.  Only the very best of friends would do that for each other.

Anyway, that little bit is too much for Victor.  Because of just that little element of the story, he wants to ban the entire show from his country.  All of the feel good "work around the obstacles and the stigmas dogging you to follow your dreams" story elements are tossed to the wayside just because of one little bit of gay acceptance.  That's just as bad as banning every episode of The Flintstones simply because that one character in that one episode was transgender.

The civil rights leader "Harvey Mammoth Milk" might have made a short appearance in this episode.

Rather than go into a lengthy diatribe about all the ways Victor Orban is wrong in this instance, I'll just very quickly list all of the Censor Monkeys he is being:

...and, for straight up banning the whole production outright, he is....

Wow! A whopping four Censor Monkeys.  It's time to dial back the tyranny there Victor. 

Of course, I certainly do sympathize with Victor's and even Tucker's objection to "wokeness". Yeah! Fuck wokeness.  Fuck wokeness back up the devil's asshole where it fell from in the first place.  But, Mr. Orban, in the process of that, leave Billy Elliot alone.  He's done nothing wrong.  He's certainly not a threat to anyone.  No government official should ever be in the business of deciding what movies, plays, tv shows, songs that his/her citizens can consume.  Let the artists do their art without harassment. Thank you.

I'll end this blog post with what I think it one of the best scenes from the Billy Elliot movie.  It's where young Billy openly defies his stern father by daring to dance right in front of him.  I find it very powerful.  Please enjoy!

Demi Lovato is a Dumbass Censor Monkey Twat

It's been a few days since one singer/song writer Demi Lovato has spilled Demi's latest kilojoules of word vomit all down Demiself's chest.  Yes, I know, Demi's been letting flow bile-ridden chunks of sloshy word food over the past few years.  However, this latest batch from Demi's mouth peaked my notice for a rather, shall I say, serendipitous reason.  For the few lucky souls who haven't heard about Demi's most recent utterance of idiocy, your luck has run out because I'm posting that very thing below.

Yup! You read that correctly. This Lovato person says we should use a more "delicate" term for creatures we haven't met and may or may not exist.  

Uh huh!  

If I were to gather every bucket of paint that exists in the world, load them all into a room with me that has absolutely no windows, opened every can of that paint and inhaled as many of the fumes as I could huff, I could never EVER in 1000 lifetimes say ANYTHING as mind-numbingly stupid as that.

However, my showcasing of this latest Demi debacle on this blog is not merely for calling an idiot an idiot.  What I AM saying is that this here co-writer of the 2012 hit song "Give Your Heart a Break" has reached an entire new level of vapid stupidity.  I'll gladly explain.

I'm sure everyone reading this blog post right now remembers a comic book I published called Jesus Needs Help. (It's still very much for sale at Amazon by the way). If you've already purchased a copy either recently or when it first came out: 1) Thank you so much. 2) You can probably see where I'm going with this already.

In this book of mine, all 10 of the Censor Monkeys descend upon one Jesus Christ as he attempts to deliver his now famous "Sermon on the Mount". They each take turns trying to "cancel" Jesus over anything in his speech they deem "problematic" from their own highly warped perspective.  I will post below a few panels from that book to show what just one of those monkeys had to say this "son of a carpenter".

The first few panels I posted to show the full context but the last panel I posted I made larger just for emphasis because that is the one that relates to Demi Demi Bo Bemi Bananafana Fo Femi Me My Mo Memi.  When I wrote that book way back in 2010, I was wracking my brain for some way that the Black Panther Monkey could object to the Sermon on the Mount.  What I came up with (that you can plainly see in that panel there) was something that I thought at the time was such a ridiculous exaggeration that no rational human person would ever espouse it, not even ironically.  Nobody with a functioning cerebral cortex could ever EVER conceive of such a stupefied notion, and if they did they'd never speak it out loud for fear of being seen as a crazed lunatic in need of heavy medication and/or round the clock psychiatric care.  They'd certainly never speak such a notion with any level of confidence like that of Sir Isaac Newton revealing his scientific findings.

But, here in the year 2021, one Demi Lovato did just that.  The very same singer who went ape shit over how a frozen yogurt shop arranged their dietary items has now just uttered the very same drivelous rhetoric of a cartoon character meant to represent the stupidest people in the known universe.  Is there a more feeble brain out there that can go beyond this level of idiocy? For the sake of our culture and the world, I hope not.

I think I've quite succinctly presented my point about how the offspring of Patrick and Dianna Lovato is dumber than a sack of rancid quesadillas and twice as fragrant.  I don't need to belabour that any further. I'll just end this post by saying I hope the former Barney the Dinosaur child actor gets the help that needed for such a mental condition as Demi's, perhaps the kind of help sung about in the video embedded below:

A review of my book I did not expect

 It's always great when something you've created (like a self-published comic book) is given any attention. Any review, positive or negative can really boost a book's visibility which could lead to more sales. Anyone, anywhere taking an interest in something I've created is always welcome. Although, some come from out of the blue in a corner of the universe I never thought I'd see. This is one of those times. The website where I found the most recent review of my book Censor Monkeys Have No Class is none other than 4chan!!!

*LOUD GASP*

Now now! Don't flip out. Yes, I'm well aware that the 4chan website has a "reputation" of sorts.  However, as the saying goes, "No Press is Bad Press" so I welcome any and all publicity that crosses my path.  So with that in mind, let's go over this 4chan thread together.

I'm not going to post a link to the entire thread simply because the channer posted every page of my book there.  If you want to see all of the pages, order the book from Amazon and/or Kindle you Sneaky Peeks.  I did however grab some screenshots of the entire thread, but I'll only put up the posts where some text was added.  Here we go:

The channer considers it "balls to the wall". Well, hey, I won't argue because that's exactly what it is.

According to the time stamp on this post, I'm guessing that this person purchased my comic at the Saskatoon Fan Expo last year.  So, hey....... it looks like there are some 4channers lurking about in Toon Town.  Does that frighten you????? *vincent price laughing gif*

He certainly agrees with me about the insidious nature of the Horrible Mother Monkey.  That's good!

Somehow, I knew the Not Muhammed Monkey would be a hit there.

Best fucking page ever, eh? I shan't quibble.

"Fucking KEK", he says! 

Ok, this might need some explaining for any normies and/or boomers reading this.  The term "kek" is from an online video game called World of Warcraft.  The internet abbreviation LOL (laughing out loud) is somehow translated into KEK in that video game.  Therefore, something is "kek" when it makes you laugh out loud. It becomes "top kek" when it is exceptionally laugh out loud funny.  So, now I hope you're caught up.

That is a fun panel.

There he is enjoying that Not Muhammed Monkey again.

There's some more kek for you.

Aaaaaaaaand he comes to the end with a belly full of keks.  Of course, these are just the original channer's posts.  Let's see what some of the other comments are.

It looks like this person is putting down my book with this comparison, but I'm definitely taking it as a compliment.  South Park is easily one of my favourite shows and has indeed been a big influence on what I do and try to do, especially their divine magnum opus: Bigger, Louder, and Uncut

Yes, I will say it, my Horrible Mother Monkey is somewhat based in part on Kyle's Mom (and we all know what she is). This is in no way me "plagiarizing" this great series nor am I trying to steal its thunder.  This is me joining them in their fight against censorship and for free expression.  They shouldn't be made to do it alone, especially not while languishing within the belly of the beast at Comedy Central which has shown a considerable push to make all of their shows "politically correct" and "intersectional".  For free expression to flourish once again, there needs to be as many voices as possible, not just the lone voices of Trey Parker and Matt Stone lifting the entire load.  Join me in joining them.

This mensa guru scholar genius is referring to this page of the book:

Yes, that's a man. In fact, that's a caricature of me circa 2012. Is that a difficult concept for some people?

"Sensible Chuckle" indeed. I did design that Scientologist Monkey to look and act like Tom Cruise, because of course he's the very whiney crazy and highly embarrassing poster boy "Messiah" for that questionable religion.  I applaud this person's ability to spot the obvious, but I'm also proud of myself because this shows that my caricature skills (especially when transforming a celebrity into a monkey) are on point.

So that is 4chan's assessment of my book.  The thread poster gave it "Many KEKs" while others were unsure.  However, I would like to point out that the person who enjoyed my book had a physical copy in his possession and read it while the others based their judgement on some blurry photos that saw online.  So, the basic bottom line is that it's best to actually read a book in order to fully enjoy it. What a concept. That could catch on.

Hey, anyone else out there that has a physical copy of my book (be it paperback or Kindle), it could be great fun to post your own assessment of it somewhere.  It'll generate traffic to your blog, youtube channel, Twitter feed, etc... as well as help generate traffic for me an day books. It's all win-win.  Feel free to let me know in the comment section what you've done with my book.