Unintentional Similarity

[fiskblack]

Accusations like sexual harassment and child abuse are hard to shake in the realm of public opinion, even if you're completely innocent. It's even worse for people who get involved in politics, which is polarizing by its very nature. Politicians and editorialists are assumed guilty of all accusations by people who are ideologically inclined to

Comments

[ext_711436]

Dude, don't sweat it... I could care less if you used other characters, what is interesting is the fact that you put something together have never even heard or read the comic that they say was copied. i did not get the reference with the knife, I just thought it was funny. But then that's my thought about this.. I mean I read every posted comic you make, I enjoy many of the jokes even ones I may not have background on, as they are funny at the time. Which is what you work is, VERY entertaining. I just find it interesting that you are able to come up with so many aspects with your comic, some recent events, pop culture references, and even some historically funny jokes that us old timers would only get. Keep up the good work.

David

[scotty_kat]

when i saw your cigarette man, i did not even think of Mr. Butts. I realized what it was from the start.
Just a manifestation of her addiction. I read Doonesbury for a short time many years ago. Not the most
interesting comic. Don't let some whiners slow you down man. I did not know the ref. But the knife
scene was a riot.

[ext_1186670]

Maybe I'm just creatively challenged, but exactly how many ways are there to draw an anthropomorphic cigarette? It's a giant white stick with a face!! In my honest opinion, you did a good job of making this character look different from "Mr. Butts". To me it looks like your character has an distinctly more feline face, unlike Mr Butts who, in all honesty, looks like Jugghead from the Archie comics. So who's really ripped off whom?

[jerynn]

I'm gonna second this notion here. There are, after all only so many ways to anthropomorphize a tobacco-filled paper tube. Additionally, the characters are, while similar in appearance, still quite different in what they represent. Mr. Butts being a personification of the tobacco industry, whilst Original Life's "Lil' Cig" is that of nicotine addiction. It's unfortunate that many do not take the time to dig below the surface, or in this case, simply read the dialogue. Given that the first Mr. Butts strips are decades old at this point, odds are that those who are flinging the rip-off accusations don't actually have clear memories of the Doonesbury character, and have taken the mere reminder of that character to be plagiarism. I myself remember reading collected Doonesbury when I was too young to get the political satire (and yes, Bloom County was funnier), and while my long term memory may be faulty, I for one did not read any substantial similarity into Stacy's figment.

[kaokeo_mitsure]

Well, also seems from your two pages of the cigarette guy, he knows he causes addiction and all that nonesense, and from that wiki article, the Mr. Butts character is all "I'm not bad for anyone!" and that rot. They look totally different, and your statement about peoples addictions being personified is spot on. Don't let some idiots cause you any stress, just ignore them, they'll eventually move on to livelier prey.

[banner]

Doonesbury did not come up with the idea of the talking cigarette, like you said before, it's a common meme.

Everything in Doonesbury came from something else. There is nothing original in the comic at all. Even the characters are all copied from someplace else. I used to read it back when it was funny, before he got married.