Posted By crates on October 23, 2009

I was reading the paper today, and when I got to the funny papers (comics), I found an odd thing.  I kept seeing the same references to volunteerism and community service in many of the strips.  Below is a summary of what I found:

1. Garfield: “Today I volunteered to help clean up the city park.”
2. The Born Loser: girl volunteered to rake leaves for the born loser who had hurt his arm.
3. Stone Soup: woman building houses for charity in Thailand.  (I hate this strip and never read it…did this time for the survey).
4. Pickles: The old lady volunteered to read to schoolchildren.
5. Luann: A service “team” started at high school “Woohoo! Volunteers rule!”
6. Baby Blues: Children volunteered for too many projects.  “Ok, I got everything straightened out with your service coach.”
7. Pooch Cafe: Pooch volunteered to visit sick kid in hospital.
8. Dennis the Menace.  Dennis volunteered to wash the Wilson’s windows.  Sign read: “Volunteer to help others.”
9. Blondie:  Dagwood volunteered to help with a senior citizens’ project.
10. The Family Circus:  Kids helping out in the kitchen.  “Hi, Mommy!  Can I volunteer to be some ‘nother help?”
11. Marmuduke: He starts a homeless shelter for dogs in the house.

Eleven out of 22 comic strips dealt with volunteerism–50%!  “Ok,” I thought, “obviously it must be Volunteer Week or something like that.”  But no,  Volunteer Week was April 19-25.  What the heck is going on?  It must be something that has been in the news or perhaps being pushed by somebody…but for the life of me I have no idea what.  I have noticed this happening before–the comics suddenly dealing with a particular subject.

Ok, I just googled some more and may have found what is going on: “18 October: The media blitz has arrived.  As we reported, in June, the Entertainment Industry Foundation (EIF) announced a commitment to incorporate volunteering and service into both news programming and ongoing fictional television series beginning the week of October 19.   EIF has branded this effort as “iParticipate” and opened a Web site at www.iparticipate.org.  There you can learn about the initiative, keep up with a blog about it, and view video clips of celebrities answering the question, “how do you serve?”” http://www.energizeinc.com/news.html

Ok…it’s some sort of media blitz by the Entertainment Industry Foundation.  I guess it even involves the funny papers.  How does this work?  Do the comic strip writers receive their subject du jour from somebody, and they dutifully accomodate their strips to  promulgate the subject?

Why am I not thrilled?   Volunteerism is a good cause isn’t it?  And the media has been influencing us for years to buy products, etc.  Brainwashing for a good cause is good isn’t it?  Why does this leave a bad taste in my mouth?  (making mental note of those strips who participated and those who didn’t)

Categories: nature
Tags: media brainwashing