Yes, contrary to popular belief, jefbot is part Japanese. And this isn’t the first time the Cornfather has dishonored jefbot’s people, either.
Sorry ’bout the late strip update – the host servers went down last night for a few hours, and I finally fell asleep while waiting for them to come back up.
I literally laughed out loud! Jefbot seems so pleased with himself while he is saying his dialogue, and then when The Cornfather answers back, you captured that face I’ve seen you make before!!! It’s crazy how talented you are with your facial expressions! AMAZING! I love that I had to read the whole thing out loud for full effect!
that’s exactly what i was going for (the face and the dialogue), Funnyshaffer! glad to know it came across effectively. and yes, i totally recommend reading it out loud for the full effect – just make sure there are no asians around when you’re doing so. 😉
Cornfather fell into the white man’s trap, thinking you can play along when an ethnic friend makes fun of their own culture. As the Madagascar penguins say: “just smile and wave, boys. Smile and wave.”
bullseye, Greg! of course, i don’t think you have to be caucasian to trigger that trap. basically, if it’s not your culture or ethnicity, you don’t get to play along, just like on that episode of seinfeld where jerry suspected his dentist of converting to judaism for the jokes. 🙂
Wow. I laughed so hard, I started choking! I love the dialogue for this one! CF’s face was epic and awesome! And I love JB’s “I’m not impressed” look as well. So yeah, I guess second everything Funnyshaffer said. 😛
i got a “choke” out of this one!? wow. i think that’s a first! glad you liked this one so much, Spanky. i actually kept laughing at this one myself as it developed, but wasn’t sure if people would see what i saw in it. so, nice to hear the positive feedback. 🙂
hahaha. now i see what you were tweeting about XD Great strip bot
yep! glad i could finally get this strip properly displayed instead of just as a twitpic, DJ. was so frustrating to have the strip done but not be able to post it after the site went down. hmm. bad omen?
I hope not ><
Had to add, think it would’ve been funny to have the background animated in the 2nd panel. I can hear this all playing out in my head again as if it were on tv. Still say I would love to see this made into a cartoon tv show. 😀
the animated bg in panel 2 would indeed be cool, Spanky. getting some work done on an animated JEFbot short is on the huge list of things to get started on in 2010. 🙂
The background to the second panel is brilliant. Excellent work, (as usual) Jeff!
thanks, JM. glad to see you guys like it when i go a bit surreal with those backgrounds. 🙂
This is hysterical!!! You have a new fan, jefbot! My mom and I had a big laugh over this one. And this strip is so true…
thanks for
infectingexposingpassing along my strip to a new reader, miss anne! and welcome, Annie’s mom! kind of a bizarre first strip to be introduced to this webcomic with, so i’m glad it gave you a laugh. 🙂I laughed at the vivid dialogue. And I like that Cornfather keeps his hands in position. Nice work!
thanks, d.! yeah, i had sketched the Cornfather with his hands down in that last panel but just that little movement screwed with the timing a bit and almost implied that he understood his inappropriateness, so glad you liked them staying up. 🙂
miso soup…me so hor….um…never mind…
*gigglesnort*
*snortgiggle*
*stomach growl*
Yup, that’s the famed ‘bot face! Nice job of capturing it on screen. Now, I’d like to see this strip redone…only this time, more Asian 😉
i fear the aclu might come knocking on my door if i made the Cornfather or jefbot any more asian, jk. 😉
Ha!! Love this one Jeffy. xDD
thanks, Nat!
I respect other people’s right to feel differently, as obviously, many do. But this one leaves me cold. I really dislike stereotyping, whether from within the culture or from outside. This strip would be a book killer for me. I’m definitely not buying
a printed collection with this in it. OK, so it does more than leave me cold. It makes me sad that this is still going on in 2009. Don’t need it, don’t want it and never, ever buying it. I feel very strongly about this.
Whoah, calm down, boyo. Now, to a certain extent, you’re right: stereotyping=bad. BUT! The fact is that you’re blithely ignoring authorial intent, which is one of my pet peeves. Instead of instantly condemning this strip, trying asking our Friendly Neighborhood Schuetze what he’s trying to do here.
But, since you don’t strike me as the type of person to do that, I’ll go ahead and do it for you:
Hey Jeff, was your intention to uphold this tendency in human nature? It does kinda seem like you’re making light of the issue, but then, it also seems like you may be criticizing it.
So which is it?
friendly neighborhood shootzee here, Drakey! heheh. although i usually avoid explaining my work so directly, suffice to say that the intent of the strip is as you assumed: to denounce racial stereotypes, even when those stereotypes are coming from within one’s own race. i almost explained that in the blog post but wanted to see how people interpreted it for themselves. and i stand by that; i’m not going to underline the “message” of the strip by blogging about it, but people are going to see what they want to see. i think i’ve done enough strips now that readers know i wouldn’t write and draw anything inflammatory like that without there being something more to it. or at least, i hope readers know that.
🙂
Stereotyping Asians is despicable: http://www.webcomicsnation.com/StanYan/wang/series.php?view=single&ID=105257
agreed, Stan! it’s time the world understood that we orientals can be just as lazy and underachieving as everybody else! waitaminute…
i totally understand and appreciate your feelings about stereotyping, Murrday, especially inside and outside the culture, which is exactly what i’m touching on in this strip. without dissecting it too much, and thus gutting any humor to be found, there’s a reason i had jefbot come in doing the accent and then not finding it funny when the Cornfather joins in. if i just wanted to make fun of asians, i would’ve just had jefbot laughing at the Cornfather’s accent.
you’ve been reading JEFbot for a while now, Murrday – do you really think i’d write a strip making fun of someone’s ethnicity without anything behind it? especially my own?
A. Murrday lightening up, it’s a cartoon!
B. Your entitled to your opinion but, you were kinda mean.
C. Dylan would probably be thrilled that there was something with asian/americans in it as there’s not that much entertainment centered on asian halfbreeds.
D. Rutt Roe!
while i do think Murrday is entitled to feel however she wants, i agree with you that “entertainment centered on asian halfbreeds” is severely lacking. hopefully, this strip will kick-start this underrepresented genre and there will be more demand in film and tv for asian/caucasian hybrids!
guess who mother teresah is?
Speaking as a guy with an American Dad and a Japanese mother, Murrday, I’d say “LIGHTEN UP” – this strip might be the very reason I’d buy the book. Big Grin – I’ve HAD this conversation before, with my room mate, back in 1975. Chris just couldn’t manage a Japanese accent to save his life. I’m glad to see shootzee has also “been there,done that”
Let’s just say that, while funny, just about everything in this strip seems kinda “deja vu” – I’m not as unique as I thought I was.
hey! glad to have another hapa in the house, Ed! and funny you mention “uniqueness” – doing this strip for the past couple of years has made me realize just how alike so many of us are! and for whatever reason, i find comfort in that. 🙂
I liked it a lot but I would probably like it better if you did animate second panels bacground as Spanky suggested. That said, I would probably react the same way as Cornfather. Sorry about that but I realy dont get what other reaction you were expecting…
I miss story arcs but this standalones are great.
i could probably make an animated gif for that 2nd panel but might not that be a bit distracting? maybe if i made it so you have to click on it. hmmm…
i’ll keep alternating between arcs and a handful of standalones from here on out, Maryz, so glad you like ’em both. 🙂
Yeah, Maryz, you’re right there. If you ask me, when somebody makes fun of themself or their background, it’s kind of weird to expect others to not join in.
I know I’ll talk about how I’m too white to (thing here), or how I’m gay enough to (behavior here), and if somebody says something to me, I don’t get offended. I usually give them a high five, because they got the joke and were clever about it. If they weren’t clever, no high-five.
ooh, that’s dangerous, Drakey! i pretty much only join in when i’m around other asians (and that usually means my brother-in-law, really).
so do i get a high-five or no high-five?
Important part is being clever about it just as Draky pointed out. So I would say that you Jefbot would get High-five, you dont have a problem with being clever funny as far as I noticed.
That was me, sorry, not using mz own computer and kinda forgot to fill out name tag.
i appreciate that, Maryz – your words and the high five!
You get a high five.
CF, I’m not so sure about. Really all he did was exactly the same thing–only, y’know… more offensive.
woo-hoo! high-five!
I’m an equal opportunity offender, I’m told I offend everyone!
how offensive! 😉
…..no word describe how to put this in, so, I shall do a motion.
*face palm*
not sure if that’s good or bad, ZL.
I’m old school in a 60s kind of way. My mom co-led the first integrated Scout troop in my part of Maryland, with Mrs. Turner, who was black. Nowadays, that’s much more normal. Then, it was a major change.
I’ll grant you your intent of humor. But you’ve got to understand. Stuff that may be funny to your generation is just not going to be funny to me, because we worked too hard to make those changes, back then. I am never going to be able to find stereotyping funny because it has hurt too many people who are my friends, and that I care about. And it’s hurt me too.
I look at that strip, and I would feel ashamed to show it, as is, to
my Asian friends. So to me, it is just plain not funny. And I stand by what I said. Others can have their own opinions. For myself, I will never buy a
book with that strip in it. How would I explain that to my friend Colleen’s little son Dylan if he found it? He’s Asian-American. If I would not show it to the child
of my friend, then I am certainly not going to buy it.
Once again you’ve missed the point. Didn’t you read Jeffs reply that his “intent” wasn’t just humor but to comment on stereotypes. Are you Asian? Because Jeff is and I think he’s in more in a position to comment on his people than you are because you have “Asian friends”.
Get off your high horse and understand that people learn more from being joked to than lectured at.
This is crazy if this offends you so much your going to find a cruel world out there when you graduate high school Murday. And is Jefbot forcing you at gunpoint to buy his book and that’s why you keep mentioning it? I, for one, will not buy it if this strip ISN’T in his book and he censors it. People need to get a sense of humor!!
Now, now. Murrday is entitled to have her opinion. (I’m assuming you’re female, Murrday, if not my apologies.) Not only is there no point in ganging up on her, but it’s totally unfair.
Let’s just respect each others individuality and leave it at that, shall we?
Sorry for all the negativity aimed at you, Murrday. You have good intentions and that’s appreciated. <3
Second that.
Foxmouse said it very well, but I would just add that as much as I apreciate how people try to bring eqality among different people, when they succeed they shoud expect that new generation wont have exactly the same outlook as them, otherwise they just make past linger where they dont want it.
Still oncde again, I cant realy disagree with you Murrday but i do not share your opinion.
although I’m sad that you’re so offended by this strip, Murrday, I completely respect your feelings, as well as your intentions to not buy the JEFbot book, since i won’t be changing or removing this or any other strip when i put the collection together.
I think it’s funny. Not only do we make fun of our own cultures we also take ourselves to seriously to the point where others can’t join the joke. We can’t have both, but we can’t not have either. We’re such fickle creatures. Humans are hypocrites, and that’s funny.
I mean, it’s okay for nerds to make fun of other nerds and nerd things, but when other “non-nerds” do it becomes taboo. Pshaw I say!
I’m half African American and, personally, if one of my friends mentioned something about fried chicken and waffles I’d ask where they kept the purple drink and watermelon. And we’d laugh, because it’s in such outrageously poor taste it’s funny.
i do tend to think that some things in our culture are taken too seriously, Foxmouse, but i understand that some people are going to be more sensitive than others on certain topics, and their feelings are completely valid. even though i tried handling the topic of stereotyping with sensitivity and humor in this strip, i knew there was a chance someone might be offended, which is fine – in the two years i’ve been doing JEFbot, the lesson that i can’t please everyone comes around again and again. and the moment i start trying to do that is the moment i should retire this strip as it will just become another boring comic with no personality.
Now that’s some conviction I can get behind. Good on ya, Jeff. I try to live by the idea that you really don’t need to try with those who are truly pleased, as they’re already pleased to start with or else they wouldn’t stick around. You keep doing what you enjoy! <3
thanks for the support, Foxmouse. you rock hard.
😆
I will spare us all to try to counter this with some geman stereotypes and fail.
Jo mei…… Miar wern die Preissen scho di Hoaxen vermiessen….
ha! not sure what you said there, Cemalidor, but bring on the german stereotypes! (i can say that ‘cuz with a last name like “Schuetze” it’s pretty apparent that i’m german, too.) 😉
I’m Asian and I think is frickin HILARIOUS!!!! :))) (And put me down for a pre-order of the book!) lol
it’s funny that the subject of “the book” keeps coming up, Anonymous – we’re still months away from that happening! but thank you and i hope you’re still reading when i start offering the pre-order! 🙂
Ahahahaha, omg I almost peed myself giggling in my office, keep em up jeffbot
happy to give you a giggle (and almost a piddle) in your office, Bincola! thanks! 🙂
This one was hilarious 😀
Go us Asians! XD
woo-hoo! go us Asians!!! glad you liked it, Marsya!
The main example that I could cite as to why being “offended” by this is ridiculous: Jokes about Hitler are funny. By building humor off of the thing–be it racism or the worst war-criminal in recent memory–we diminish it, rather than encouraging it. There is no glorifying going on here–some tastelessness, perhaps, but no glorifying.
To be offended by this strip is a lot less sensible than to be offended by, for instance, dead baby jokes, which I’d like to point out is a category of humor (insofar as it actually is humor) that survives entirely off of its glaringly obvious ridiculousness and immaturity.
Nobody is aiming to say that this kind of behavior is okay when it’s done in seriousness. In fact, this kind of behavior is only “okay” when it’s done to mock the stereotype. With its use as a joke, the very hatred being imitated loses power. It is no longer going to provoke misery–instead, with each reduction by this joke’s existence, the mocking elicits further measures of incredulity–similar to the way that anyone spouting Hitler’s rhetoric with sincerity will be laughed out of town by the majority of the world’s population.
When we treat jokes like this with fear or revulsion, however, we give the behavior a bit more legitimacy. There is power in words. There is more power in laughter, though.
totally agree, Drakey. and just as you and others have mentioned, humor is the best way to talk about “touchy” subjects like racism, sexism, religion and sexuality. and you’re right, i’d only do this kind of strip to “mock the stereotype” since i have no interest in doing that kind of humor without it actually having something to say.
to your point though, even after decades of Hitler-mocking on TV, books and film in shows like “Hogan’s Heroes” or a handful of movies from Mel Brooks and even in some Bugs Bunny cartoons, i know several people who get completely upset at even the mention of Hitler, which is their prerogative. i think they have every right to be upset, but i also think that these works shouldn’t be censored just because they might offend.
Happy Thanksgiving, Jefbot!
P.S. Early Thanksgiving.
Anyway, Great comic strip today!
thanks, Freddy! hope you and your loved ones have an awesome Thanksgiving! (and glad you liked the strip!)
I LOVE this strip, bot! But not as much as the controversy it has created. It’s interesting to me that some might take offense without seeing what bot is saying here. He’s not “stereotyping.” He’s commenting on people who stereotype. And I think it’s rearry, rearry funny.
Ooooooh snap! The Cornfather following up a bad joke, with the REAL Cornfather commenting with the same joke!
Anywho, stereotyping is a really interesting controversy when you stop and think about it. Obviously different people have different views, and I can understand someone who worked very hard to gain rights for a specific group feeling more strongly about certain stereotypes. But I’d just ask that you remember that there are a great many of us even today fighting for those rights, and while often they are for different groups *cough*personallyfightingforgayrightssinceforever*cough* the jokes are there for a reason, to diffuse a bad situation.
Our generation feels comfortable making those jokes because they’re a part of a culture in which we recognize that we are all different and instead of pushing each other away, often come together as humans. Nine times out of ten, a bad racist joke is rebutted with an opposing racist joke (See Avenue Q’s “Everyone’s a little bit racist song” song for examples).
yes, the “real” Cornfather commenting on the “fake” Cornfather is so meta, it’s mindblowing, CornflakeJustice!
and just as you, Drakey and others have pointed out – it’s true that jokes do help to get people talking and thinking about things that might be hard to bring up otherwise.
and just to clarify, by explaining the intent behind this strip, i’m not saying my lil’ ol’ webcomic can be a big instrument for social change, but it got a few of us talking, right?
i love Avenue Q, btw – and i’m asian and an english major!
🙂
Poor white people. We can’t do nothin’. XD
heh. well, you can do impressions of other white people… but that’s really not all that funny. you’re right. 😉
Mom never gives me any miso 🙁
you have to ask her nicely.
Wow, seeing where this commentary has gone is yet another level of entertainment!
who knew?
New reader, and what a strip to stumble upon.
I’ll just blithely ignore the controversy above (aside from commenting that I will ignore it), and say that this’s likely one of the better comics I’ve found recently. And will look forward to it greatly. ^^;
just wanted to give you a hearty, “Welcome, Mychyl!”
and yep, you certainly stopped by here at an interesting time. although JEFbot readers tend to be quite vocal, the comments for this strip were more impassioned than usual, methinks. 🙂
glad you’re liking my webcomic and hope you’ll be stopping by again for new installments!
Oooooooooooooookaaaaaaaaaaaaay.
*LOL*
But you brough this one onto yourself, jef. You should know Michael by NOW. If you start acting funny then don’t complain when he makes fun of something you made fun of yourself first! If Michael had come talking like that on his own, then yes, I would agree that he was making fun of your background. But lets be realistic. YOU started it! You get what you saw!
*evil laugh of doom*
yes, agreed! jefbot may have led by example on this one so he only has himself to blame, but he doesn’t have to like it, Sonitan. heheh. we’ll see if jefbot continues to play up those stereotypes in the future or if he’s learned his lesson. 🙂
Sociology AND miso.
Told ya, you run a classy joint! ^^