Below is my email to commenter “Toby”, who took exception to the negative comments. Toby’s comments can be read here, here and here.
Hi Toby,
Hope you don’t mind me emailing you directly, but I wanted to respond to your comments on Son of Stuck Funky, and if I post my response there, you probably won’t see it.
You said:
Wow! What a lot of nit-picking haters comment on this thread! If you all dislike the strip so much, why do you bother reading it?
A valid question. Not all the regulars at SoSF dislike the strip. Many, myself included, are longtime fans who take issue with how over 40 years (!), Funky Winkerbean has become an unfunny, self-serious soap opera.
Mr. Batiuk deserves serious credit for addressing the same-sex couple at the prom issue, regardless of how he develops his characters.
That’s debatable. The same-sex couple consisted of two hitherto-unforeseen characters about whom we know absolutely nothing except they want to go to the prom together. Batiuk didn’t even give these characters names. We saw them buy their tickets, nosey old Roberta witnessed the ticket sale and launched a protest, and principal Nate held an assembly, where he stated that there was nothing in the student handbook prohibiting same-sex couples from attending prom. Some defense.
By placing the issue in a nationally syndicate strip, Mr. B. does those kids a major service and THAT is the important aspect of this matter…
I hate to sound cynical, but Mr. B. also garnered a ton of press for himself (and for his just-published collection, The Complete Funky Winkerbean Vol. I). Meanwhile, he creates two cardboard “gay characters” who probably will never be seen again. He also (today and tomorrow) has another, closeted student thank the principal for making things “better” . The student speaks to principal Nate while obscured the whole time by scenery. In this way Batiuk scores himself some bonus points without taking a chance by “outing” an established character.
…one that seems to have gone right over the heads of the “oh this is all so ten minutes ago” phoney sophisticates who have been negatively commenting.
I have been running Son of Stuck Funky for over two years, and was a regular commenter on the blog that preceded it. I know and like the readers of my blog, and the vast majority are indeed sophisticated, especially regarding popular culture. Many of them recall that cartoonist Lynn Johnston featured an openly gay teenage character (nearly twenty years, not “ten minutes” ago) and handled the matter much more artfully than Batiuk could ever hope to do.
The vast majority of my readers are thoughtful, tolerant people. Some of my readers happen to be gay. What they are not is “phoney”.
Batiuk has been hyping Funky Winkerbean’s gay prom storyline since last year, and garnered plenty of attention, as he did with his Pulitzer-nominated breast cancer story. All my readers did was rightfully call “bullshit” where they saw it on his handling of a topic that deserves more thoughtful, less shallow treatment.
Sorry you didn’t enjoy your visit to SoSF. By the way, I doubt anyone really thought you were Tom Batiuk posting under a pseudonym, but it was just too good to resist. Anyway, you’re welcome to visit again and comment any time you like.
Thanks and best regards from a fellow Jerseyan.
TFHackett
Son of Stuck Funky
Son of Stuck Funky 