This week’s new Dustinland comic is about the point of life, more or less. I think when you’re a parent, these sort of things take on a new urgency, because it’s one thing to stumble through life believing whatever you believe, doing what you can to stay sane, but it’s another thing to teach a new human what to believe and what ideas should guide their life.
As I say in the comic, I don’t really know what the point of it all is, obviously. I’m not religious, so I don’t have that to guide me. And I try to be a good person and all that, I try to live in the moment. It’s just hard. These days, the more information I receive, the more depressed I get. And yet a life of blissful ignorance also feels irresponsible. So I’m really not sure what to do or think these days, and that certainly makes it hard to be responsible for someone else’s life. But kids grow up and figure things out and adopt their own beliefs. The best I think we can do is make sure they turn out to be good people, kind, nice, grateful, insert positive adjective here, you get the picture.
Man, now I’m bumming myself out as usual. Sorry! Next week I’ll go back to wacky zany honk honk clown horn.
Dustinland - The Blog 
Encapsulates a lot of truths about what most people with intact craniums must be thinking.
Everyone can have their variations upon these themes – I’m not envious of superstition-based believer wingnuts at all, but I’m well aware that knowledge of humanity intellectual futilities does not lead to bliss, and I think parenthood in this supersystem is bound up with overreach and frustration, but so what, zany zany honk honk is what comments sections are for, too. Or, perhaps like, like, more stuff, thanks and more thanks. It’s a living on both sides of the wall – great comic, is what I’m sayin…
Thank you my friend! You know, while I was drawing this comic, a bunch of things came into my head. I remember a Woody Allen movie where he shows himself as a child telling his parents he shouldn’t bother trying because the sun is going to burn out and engulf the Earth, or something to that effect. Also a comic called Johnny The Homicidal Maniac, drawn by the guy who eventually went on to make the more kid-friendly Space Invader Zim cartoon… a scene where a religious character was about to die and had no fear, and his killer said “I envy your conviction.” I guess my point to all this is that I’m not the first nor the last to tackle this subject matter, and that does make me feel better. And so do comments like yours.
Hang in there. One of the best decisions I’ve made in the last year or so is to just stop consuming so much news. Its just depressing. I had to wrestle with whether that meant I was becoming one of the uninformed masses but, so far, what I’ve found is that news is so pervasive that it is hard to be completely uninformed.
I still know what is going on around the world – maybe not to the level that I once did – but I’m less stressed and angry. Cynical though it may be, I’ve lost hope that I’m able to significantly impact the course of events in the United States as long as 40%+ of the population is willing to support anti-democratic, right-wing, fascist leaders.
I already know I will never vote for a candidate at any level of society who says they are Republican – I can’t stomach the idea of voting for someone who is willing to support what that group is doing – so that means I’ve eliminated a huge swath of things I need to follow. I already know everything I need to know about the political right in the US and I’ve already seen that, despite hope after hope, the political “left” in the United States is bad at making convincing arguments to the vast majority of the citizenry. The US Supreme Court is stacked for (likely) the remainder of my life and the Justice Department under Merrick Garland has been a horrible disappointment.
See? I know so much already. *goes off to cry*
(seriously, it is okay to give yourself permission to take an information-diet and NOT doom-scroll. It does not make you less intelligent and likely will not impact your awareness of what is going on in the world as much as you fear.
If you haven’t tried it – give it a month and see how you feel)
I am 1000% in agreement with your less news POV and I have been right there with you for a while. Last year I read a book called Hate Inc which really dissects how the 24/7 news media apparatus exists by profiting off making us angry and unhappy. And not even by lying — even when they are 100% telling the truth, everything is done in a way to create outrage and fury.
Of course then my mom will email me 10 news stories, each of which has the word “Atrocity” in the headline, so I really can’t hide forever, but I do my best. It’s just weird being in this “I give up” phase of life, but I guess I can relate to George Carlin more now.
Being a human, religious or not means you have plenty of outside things to blame for life / your life.
Choosing to be a parent, means you are a god to living things, so the meaning of life is in your hands / responsibility to those living things.
You can moan about the world but once you choose to be a parent you can’t because you’ve chosen to play God yourself, the circle of incompetence is complete.
Well that’s why if you notice in the comic I only moan privately in my own head. When guiding my kiddo I try to drop the positivity on him.
Being a parent = being a “god” (whatever that is supposed to denote)? Ah, that’s not quite the experience that awaits the individual adult human. Who in their right mind thinks of themselves of some sort of world-encompassing deity when trying to get the little shaver to pick up their clothes?
A biological parent is someone who had sex with a member of the opposite gender that produced a human life form (there’s exceptions to that, but we’re talking almost all parents here). There’s no “god” whatsoever in that basic life function, so the parent can and will and should moan if they feel like it. Maybe the kid will grow to like the occasional empathetic moaning from Mom or Pops, who knows?
Becoming a parent mandates become a public optimistic idiot at all times? Sounds boring as hell. (Full disclosure: I am not, and will never be, a biological parent. You procreative fellas can “play God” if you want, fine by me (sarcasm squared).