Friday, Nov. 05, 2004 - 9:45 a.m.

Best Toon Ever

Happy Guy Fawkes Day!

Thanks, Melissa, for alerting me to this new masterpiece. I'm talking about Pirates and Emperors, an incisive critique of the State done in the style of Schoolhouse Rock. I think this one is even made with olde-fashioned cell animation for authentic look and feel. Man, I wish I could have watched this one as a kid between cartoons on ABC on Saturday mornings.

In the credits, it says, "inspired by the writing of Noam Chomsky." I was a little shocked by that, since Chomsky is a progressive liberal who hasn't advocated anarchosyndicalism since the 1970's. Perhaps this toon expresses a damning rejection of the State by accident. Indeed, on subsequent viewings, I could see that it doesn't necessarily diss all governments, only the ones that act like empires. It could even be read to be pro-Sandinista. But since it neither says anything positive about other governments, nor promotes any kind of "let's take back our government" strategy, I choose to read it as a dismissal of coercive authority as such.

In our dismal times, this cartoon brought tears of hope to my eyes when I thought that maybe it is possible to change people's minds on this topic with some common-sense reasoning and some song-and-dance.

And when you go to his website, please click on "Help Out" and send director Eric Henry some money, cause I want to see more of his stuff, and I hope you will too.

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