[1183 – 1185] Nightmares
└ posted on Wednesday, 10 June 2020, by Novil
- Policeman: Hands up!
- Sandra: Woo!
- Policeman: Oops, wrong house.
- Rioter: How do you like that, racist scum?!
- Richard: You don’t have to worry, Sandra. There haven’t been any riots in the country for a week.
- Sandra: I know, but…
- Sandra: I’ve been having all kinds of nightmares for weeks now. And they keep getting worse!
- Eugene Tyson: Please excuse the intrusion, but let me tell you that such nightmares shouldn’t be taken lightly!
- Richard: Oh! How would you know?
- Eugene Tyson: My name is Eugene Tyson. I was professor for oneirology at Yale. My therapies helped dozens of people to overcome severe trauma!
- Richard: You were professor at Yale,… and now you’re working as a sweeper?
- Eugene Tyson: I posted something wrong on Twitter…!
- Richard: You’re lucky to still be alive!
![[1183 – 1185] Nightmares](/comics/2020-06-10-1185-nightmares.png "[1183 – 1185] Nightmares")
The first strip is the best. Great use of those brushes and zipatone. Very fitting the mood. Second strip, it looks like a toss-up over consoling Sandra over her nightmares, or consoling Sandra over the reasons they’re changing the sheets before dawn. Third strip, Twitter should not be used to ruin careers. Even President Daintyhands, no matter how hard he abuses his Plot Armor.
I wonder what the Russian and Burmese families (Larissa. Cloud and YeThusa.) have to say about recent events? As for people talking about recent events,
-the police are a good thing, a good force to have. Officers who fire on non-violent protesters count as rioters, same as plainclothes Agitator plants. Police who quit en mass sure are acting suspicious.
-George Floyd was arrested over counterfeit money and should have been arrested. 9 minutes is more than enough time to cuff a subdued man and push him into the back of a car.
-Every one of those protesters should have been at home, not running out on the streets like a scared flock of birds.
I am sorry, Powree, but this is just scratching the surface.
I think you really haven’t covered Sargon, 4chan, Tim Pool, and Ben Sharpiro–aka people who like to claim they are centrist (albeit a fake one) and wanted to be seen as “I am better than these two presented…except are actually virulent scum bags and probably side with police/alt-right/whoever pisses of progressives but using atheism as their standard of fake truth”. Probably carved up their political domain and turn “two sides” into “warring states”.
Even going to include South Park sadly enough, consider that many of their “opinions”–at least lately–are based on personal assumption than actual research.
Sometimes I do feel that even centrist and moderate–or at least the term consider that people like Sargon aren’t exactly honest–being corrupted as well. Then again, this is me speaking as a guy who spend time with GamerGate (non-vocally at least since I was pissed at Anita not getting Y The Last Man) and “anti-establishment” (i.e.- bandwagoning every ideology–even both Socialist and Libertarians like thinking that Corporations are evil and old people are hoarding money from social security) before disillusioned with them.
Sandra’s nightmare would be my constant frustrations. I am sorry, but I just wanted to vent out yet this comic doesn’t seem to have any gripes I have.
@ t209:
Not Sandra’s Dream being my frustrations.
I meant if Sandra’s nightmares are based on my frustrations, she would have gone mad from even seeing the people I mentioned and their “news reports”.
Hmm… Except, the more we’ve seen of “the rioters”, the more we’ve learned that they’re composed of right-wing extremists and actual police out to delegitimize both the protesters and anti-fa. And while “the looters” and rioters steal and destroy property, the police are literally murdering people, instigating and escalating violence against peaceful protesters while leaving the rioters be, and have even been attacking journalists without provocation. Meanwhile, the protesters have increasingly been doing something you’d expect the police to be doing: They’ve been policing themselves… There’s seriously no way of looking at this situation and deciding that “both sides are just as bad” any longer.
And to all those who say that the bad police are just “a few of bad apples,” I just want to point out that the saying ends “spoils the bunch” so, you know… and, personally, I think this is more of an orchard problem: If an orchard produces a few bad apples that disproportionately kills a few people of certain ethnicities every year, then I think that orchard should be shut down…
If I’m Novil and I just want to see my comment section exploded, I probably not bother to draw any comic and just put a warning like he did before he upload this comic, grab a popcorn, enjoy the comment section where people argue with each other.
After that, just put another warning, “Sike! I had my entertainment reading you guys arguing with each other, so no comic from me about this topic.”
I like that the snowflakes outraged by the fact that this comic is not blindly following the current morality play are outnumbered by actual adults.
I shall wait to see where this goes. Because you enlighten me as often as you amuse me.
And I have had the dream of police breaking in to the wrong house as well.
Nachum wrote:
Citation needed, and citations for your citation needed.
What’s the source of that statistic?
Is it talking about all crimes, including speeding, drink-driving, shoplifting, marijuana possession, tax evasion, insurance fraud, embezzlement, invading Iraq, betraying oaths of office, beating up a cop’s wife several times a week, covering up for a cop who beats his wife, opportunistic rape of minors, organised sexual abuse of minors, murder, robbery, arson, vehicular intimidation, littering and so on and so forth, or only “blue-collar violent” felonies?
Is it prison population?
What if courts tend to sentence black people for longer or parole boards tend to let white people out and send black people back to jail? If the courts sentence ten white guys to 8 years and ten black guys to 12 years every year and the white guys get out after 4 but the black guys stay in for 10, then the same conviction rate for the same crimes will produce a black prison population that’s far larger than the white prison population.
Is it conviction rates?
What if the courts tend to convict white people of misdemeanours and black people of felonies when presented with the same evidence of the same crimes? That’d skew the hell out of your felony conviction rates, wouldn’t it?
Of course, for it to get to court a crime has to be prosecuted, and that means it has to be recorded. What if police officers have a strong bias towards issuing tickets to people with different skin colours and letting people with matching skin colours off with a caution, and the police force is 99% white? That’s going to be a whole lot of white guys getting off with a caution and a whole lot of black guys getting tickets, isn’t it?
Even that’s not the first line of possible bias, though. See, the police bod can’t do either of those things until the crime is detected (or a person is framed for something), so even the most honest, least biased police officers, whether they’re hardline diligent or soft-touch forgiving, can be used to skew the crime detection stats simply by deploying them in different streets. If they stop and search every twentieth person coming down each of ten streets, nine of them in majority-black neighbourhoods and one in a majority-white neighbourhood, they’re going to be finding a lot more black people in possession than whites, aren’t they?
I suggest the video ending in v=E8hj4IseFP4 with the title:
“Dangers of Woo: Despite Making Up Only 13% of the Population … ”
Yes, there are sources in the video description.
Nikary Flare wrote:
Imagine going to the bank to deposit some cash and seeing a sign above the door saying it hadn’t been robbed in 8 days.
Arent wrote:
“They hate us for our freedoms!” Dude. Bullshit so old the roses growing in it have stems thicker than your right wrist. Well, maybe not but thicker than your left wrist!
Again, as above, [citation needed].
From the Independent:
25. Namibia
24. Austria
23. Philippines
22. Netherlands
21. United States of America
20. Spain
19. Lithuania
18. Belgium
17. Estonia
16. France
15. Australia
14. Latvia
13. Germany
12. Portugal
11. Canada
10. United Kingdom
9. Ireland
8. Denmark
7. Switzerland
6. Slovenia
5. New Zealand
4. Norway
3. Sweden
2. Finland
1. Iceland
The Good Country Index on Wikipedia puts the USA 40th overall in 2018 and 62nd on prosperity and equality in 2017.
From Frommer’s:
The World’s Most Tolerant Countries
For Embracing Multiculturalism: Canada
For Religious Tolerance: Albania
For Personal Freedom: Benelux
For Leniency, South American Style: Uruguay
For Celebrating Indigenous Culture: New Zealand
For Being Africa’s Most LGBT-Friendly Destination: South Africa
For True Hospitality: Ireland
For Outperforming Its Peers: Costa Rica
For Taking “Never Again” Seriously: Rwanda
For Setting the Standard: Scandinavia and Iceland
From Expat:
Canada
Australia
New Zealand
Norway
Brazil
USA
Hey, look at that! Someone does put you among the top 6.
From Global Citizen:
10 Most Tolerant Countries of 2016
1. Luxembourg
2. Canada
3. New Zealand
4. Iceland
5. Ireland
6. Uruguay
7. Netherlands
8. Finland
9. Belgium
10. Portugal
10 Least Tolerant Countries of 2016
1. Afghanistan
2. Sudan
3. Yemen
4. Egypt
5. Iran
6. Libya
7. Mauritania
8. Central African Republic
9. Russia
10. Democratic Republic of Congo
Another two lists without the USA anywhere in them, so, again, [citation needed] for the USA being number one, unless you mean specifically the most tolerant of people carrying the flags of traitors who fought against the government in an attempt to continue chattel slavery and also carrying firearms invading and occupying a government building and of people wearing Hakenkreuz armbands chanting nazi slogans and marching on a Synagogue with incendiary devices and, again, firearms. If you mean that Germany wouldn’t put up with that shit, specifically, you’re right. They wouldn’t.
I frankly find this hideous.
And it is actually the batching together that did it.
I knew you were sort of anti-feminist, but I let myself think you were only against exaggerations of reversed oppression.
However, believing this narrative of good people being thrown under the bus for one bad tweet – this is just naive. The problem is not the one tweet, but the underlying opinions, and the only-now-changing silence of society towards them.
The nightmare strips – while I find them unrealistic – make it possible to emphatize with Sandra and her natural and human fear. But for me as a citizen of Israel – a country who’s no doubt seen terrorism – this strikes as far more similar to IDF soldiers’ accounts of what happens in occupied Palestinian territories. This scenario is much more plausible, in my mind, with soldiers attacking oppressed civilians, than with rioters attacking random white people. Which is kind of the opposite of your point.
Chris wrote:
Usually that is attributed to FBI Uniform Crime Reporting Statistics, Table 43a. Which shows a breakdown by race of perpetrators of several crimes.
Okay, so, at the risk of being called out for being an SJW soyboy chuck,I have to ask: What is the point you’re trying to make in that second strip? Do you believe that Antifa and BLM protesters are targeting white civilians? Or are you equating the riots to the violence perpetrated by the police? I ask because this seems like a dishonest framing of the actual situation. The riots are mainly against property, like ransacking Targets and Macy’s. Now, if you wanted to criticize that, criticize that (though, let’s not forget that PROPERTY IS NOT AS IMPORTANT AS HUMAN LIVES). Don’t frame it in a way that implies “disgruntled citizens smashing flatscreens is on the same level as government-funded law enforcement extrajudicially killing people of color.”
Also, while we’re here, about two strips ago, you had Landon say,”Deus cult,” which is a motto that has long been embraced by the alt-right. What was up with that?
@ AdamNewTA:
*vult
@ ArcaneDarkness:
This. Thank you.
Breja wrote:
And back when it wasn’t that or “Who haz da bestest pic in da whole pinstagram”, it was “Our neighbours are getting a new fence”. For some reason, they’ve always felt the need to follow something, or someone. Social media just puts it one click away.
Also, there was a time where, after having a reaction to distant and often several days late news you had a time to think about your strong opinion while you’re walking up to your neighbour’s door. Then came the time where you had your news from evening news on TV and morning newspapers with a delay of a few hours, and you had a few minutes to think while you waited for the weather report to finish and was dialling in a phone number. Nowadays, you read it on the Internet, you post on the Internet, then you can’t retract it any more so you’re bound to defend it, because you wouldn’t admit in front of the whole world that you were wrong. And thinking and forming own opinions is too much work anyway.
Breja wrote:
Me approve. Have a like.
@ Tadrix:
Kinda makes you wonder if the creation of the internet was a blessing or a curse.
Of course it is neither, and the truth lies somewhere in between. The internet is kind of like electricity, or explosives, or nuclear power; when used responsibly they can be a great benefit to humanity. Used irresponsibly, however, they will inevitably lead to tragedy.
Novil & Powree. You rock! Don’t listen to haters. Still one of my favourite webcomics.
@ Anzar:
I don’t see any haters here. Mostly all i see here (aside from the bootlickers) is people offering legitimate criticism of a flawed comic.
Yeesh. I shouldn’t have read the comments. Now that’s what I call discourse.
I just wanted to say thank you for this comic. Both in this specific page and in its entirety.
I’ve been having a very similar issue to Sandra’s nightmares for the past couple weeks, except my own nightmares are always very surreal, and I know there are a lot of factors going into their creation. I have plans to speak with my doctor about them soon.
That said, this comic has been one of the rare ones I can go to whenever I’m having a bad day and need something to perk me up. No matter how dark things get within the storyline, there’s always something sweet or funny or just plain ridiculous snuck in somewhere, and I love it with all my heart.
So thank you, Oliver and Powree, for creating such a beautiful work of art and literature.
Wow, equating protestors with the corrupt cops? And parroting the lies of Trump about some “Antifa terrorists”? What’s next, claiming Covid-19 is a hoax? Or making a “balanced” strip about how Covid-19 is half a hoax?
By equating protestors and the brutal cops, you are supporting the corrupt cops and the Trump administration. Good, decent people don’t do either.
@ Dan:
I will never support Communists. My grandparents didn’t flee Communism for America to fall to Communism.
@ AnotherBear:
No Antifa follows in the footsteps of the Red Army, which my great-aunt had to hide from, lest she be raped. As for my grandfathers, my father’s father was in the Pacific making sure the Battleship Washington could keep bombarding Japanese islands, and my mother’s father was in the AK, the Polish Resistance. I thank commies for nothing.
I can see that the comments section is quite turbulent so here’s my opinion: this is a bad take but I’m not upset.
strip one: the problem I have with this strip is that it depicts the problem with the cops is incompetence and brutality, while the actual problem is malice and brutality. the cops may be dumb but the problem here is cops being evil.
strip two: honestly this is overblown, the media has given the impression that this sort of thing is happening all over but for the most part its not.
strip three: this one is fine and could have been a strip on it’s own.
I’m not going to loose my mind because a German cartoonist didn’t quite understand what was happening in the U.S.
Chris wrote:
So, how often did you hold antiracism rallies against IS, Hamas, BDS? And how often did you complain about Americans or Israelis?
Chris wrote:
Sorry, but if the answer to above question is ‘not once’ and ‘hundreds of times’ then you simply are no antiracism guy. Then you’re quite the epitome of racism.
Zelnik wrote:
Agreed. It’s nice to see something not kowtowing to the twitterati for once.
@ Starfox5:
where are the protesters in this strip you mention? If you’re misconstruing rioters/looters with legitimate peaceful protesters, that’s on you.
@ jamesraylee:
Well, the combination of the previous meme strip and the comic’s message seems to conflating it to “two extreme sides that ignore moderates”, which I felt is ignoring that Black Lives Matter types (reasonable ones at least) are the ones pushing for police accountability rather than rioting mostly.
Calling out assholes, yes. But the writer seems to be oversimplifying into “two bad sides”.
Strange since Powree is the left leaning anti-establishment guy (the type to call out police brutality rather harshly), who should have known better (assuming if his source doesn’t include Sargon of Akkad under assumption that his fake “centrist” label is true, and god forbid 4chan, assuming if he bother to check on their “supporting Trump just for the sake of annoying people yet seems to bleed reactionary views from time to time” instead of “edgy but well-meaning rebel dudes” of old).
Don’t get me wrong, I mean Sargon calling himself as atheist and his formal facade with 4chan’s rebel reputation might give impression to an average internet user that they are “reasonable people”.
Thankyou for using your platform in this way, it’s very brave to do.
Definitely an emotional curb stomp, and I look forward to seeing how the rest of this arc plays out.
Well played going the whole “a plague on both your houses” route. It pretty much sums up what I think is the silent majority’s view on this BS situation today. Thank you for this!
Guys… the first two trips are Sandra having nightmares, ie frightening dreams. Since when are dreams an accurate depiction of reality?
Sandra sees violence in the new or whatever coming from violent cops and violent rioters, then dreams of cops violence and riot violence affecting her. It doesn’t need to make sense past that, especially when you consider how nonsensical dreams can be.
I love these strips.
My view on the protests is an unhappy one. Maybe actual rioting in the street really is what it will take to get politicians to get off their asses and do something already to make the American police force act less like a bunch of violent thugs. Maybe this really is what needs to happen now. But it doesn’t make me any more sympathetic to individual protesters. Yeah, people who get treated like shit start acting like jerks. That’s inevitable and it’s frankly unreasonable to expect otherwise. But people who act like jerks are still acting like jerks, no matter what their excuses are.
To compare it to something from the opposite side, I can understand that electing Donald Trump was an inevitable reaction to the way US liberals were getting increasingly sure that they could make all of conservatism go away by just ignoring it completely. I can see how electing a shits-spewing subhuman to the highest office in the land might have been a necessary way of saying that half the population can’t just be declared to be irrelevant without consequences. But does that make Donald Trump anything other than completely worthless? It most certainly does not.
So again, I love these strips. Fine, maybe some people need to act like jerks to get something done. But some other people have to keep pointing out that they’re acting like jerks, or else we’re going to start thinking that acting like this is normal.
The first strip is a reality of SWAT forces and the second strip is a reality of why all this rioting is fucking horrible, to anyone who may be a rioter in this comment section, please remember there are people with autism who have nothing to do with any of this. The third one is just funny.
@ Name:
That’s exactly what cops have been doing to citizens for decades.
I have twitter but I don’t use it much…so thanks anyways.
@ ArcaneDarkness:
Bye!
@ YanByan:
Bye!
@ Crabcake:
Well don’t read it then. Go write your own one.
AdamNewTA wrote:
Do you believe that Antifa and BLM protesters are targeting white civilians? Or are you equating the riots to the violence perpetrated by the police? I ask because this seems like a dishonest framing of the actual situationIt is a dishonest framing of the situation by all-pervading 24-hour news media that has infiltrated Sandra’s mind and caused her to have nightmares about the things the media portray.
Hey, I watch that channel too. I seem to have done to my hairline what he’s done to his tie.
Arent wrote:
So, how often did you hold antiracism rallies against IS, Hamas, BDS? And how often did you complain about Americans or Israelis?
I was a little busy hunting them in boots stained with my own blood to take time off to attend a rally, and lots, especially when they got a load of us killed by being stupid, bloodthirsty, greedy, hateful, aggressive and ignorant.
Look up “false dichotomy.”
Paul Kauphart wrote:
This guy. This guy gets it. Well done, this guy, for reading beyond the first half of each strips.
Please calm down. The author has given his take on current events.
No you don’t necessarily agree with it but you can accept it or leave.
This strip along with several other recent strips have brought this comic to a political tipping point.
I am willing to stay and accept it although I don’t entirely agree.
Great work Novil and Powree.
Chris wrote:
Are you now seriously trying to claim that you hunted IS members? I’m sorry, but in view of your comments so far, I do not believe you.
But let’s assume for a second that you are actually honest. Then you would immediately agree that the left should first and foremost criticize actual prejudice and racism – IS, Hamas, BDS – and then, afterwards, they could also criticize in a constructively and balanced manner racism and antisemitism of both white and black US citizens.
Zelnik wrote:
Very much this!!
It’s time this nightmare was out in the open and finally dealt with
AdamNewTA wrote:
That was this very obscure thing, but you might have heard of it, it’s called a “JOKE”. Seriously, you people need to chill, hard.
And before you say anything – unlike (presumably) you, I have actually suffered (albeit very indirectly) under actual catholic extremism, which is where the motto comes from – if I can take it as a joke that it was, then so can you!
Crabcake wrote:
Flawed? Who appointed you as a definitive art critic?
And calling people “bootlickers” is pretty hateful…at least according to certain standards.
@ AnotherBear:
Because seizing six square blocks of Seattle is totally an anti-fascist thing to do….
@ AdamNewTA:
Just a side note here, but if someone is set on coming into my store and smashing the flatscreens that I paid for, I DO hope they are prepared to die- looters and rioters smashing someone’s property are voluntarily lowering the value of their own life to the cost of a bullet. You don’t have to agree- Just don’t loot my house or business, and we can get along just fine.
Draugdur wrote:
What was the joke? TDraugdur wrote:
I get that it was a joke. This is a comedic comic strip after all. However, the phrase is used in the second panel, as part of the setup, not the final panel, as part of the punchline. Here is the line in context:
Cloud: Of course, my hero will be God’s shining beacon in a sea of corruption! An impeccable champion in mankind’s eternal struggle against moral depravity!
Landon: Deus vult!
Cloud: There must be a way to give your dude three boobs!
Landon: This mod looks promising: Pepe18’s Essential Gender Pack.
So are supposed to think that Cloud and Landon are wrong in believing that, to combat corruption and “moral depravity,” they should embrace fascist ideology? Or is it that they want to give their character 3 boobs? (Not to mention, “Essential Geneder Pack” also implies a little bit of transphobia)
@ AnotherBear:
In an internment camp (Tule Lake) in Newell, CA, after being discharged from the Army for simply being of Japanese descent? (He was Japanese-American, born in Hawaii.)
AnotherBear wrote:
My father was hitting one of those beaches on June 6, 1944.
Antifa walks in the footsteps of the people who were shooting at him, and the nice lieutenant who swam back out from cover to pull my father up and to shore after my father stepped in a hole and went under, burdened down by so much equipment he would not have come back up without help.
I will not let any “anti”-fascist tell me otherwise.
This strip is set in Europe, right?
Today’s installment doesn’t really completely speak to Americans like me. There are no white right-wing gun nuts invading state capitols, for one. No cops facing black people in full armor, yet welcoming white people (like months ago) in ordinary uniforms.