2009-11-16
Original: 2009-11-16 on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Transcript
Panel 1 (header banner: WRONG APPROACH):
A man with red flame-like hair stands at the front of a classroom gesturing toward a green chalkboard. Several students sit in the foreground facing him. On the board is written: 2 = 3x² + 1
Teacher: "Kids! Math is fun! It's like a safari to find the value of x."
Panel 2 (header banner: RIGHT APPROACH):
A different scene, with a bespectacled man visible in an inset at the right speaking to students.
Narration/teacher text: "If you're a mathematician, there are about 10 people on Earth who understand what you do, and none of them have the power to fire you. You have no set hours, everyone respects you, and you work about 5/8ths of the year. If you go to a bar and tell a woman you are employed for your intellect alone, she will probably sleep with you. But hey, feel free not to do your homework. It's not my problem."
Votey:
Two people, one bespectacled person leaning in and a younger person writing/drawing at a desk.
Bespectacled person: "Wow, you'll go through a lot to avoid drawing a background."
Younger person: "Hooh yeah."
A man with red flame-like hair stands at the front of a classroom gesturing toward a green chalkboard. Several students sit in the foreground facing him. On the board is written: 2 = 3x² + 1
Teacher: "Kids! Math is fun! It's like a safari to find the value of x."
Panel 2 (header banner: RIGHT APPROACH):
A different scene, with a bespectacled man visible in an inset at the right speaking to students.
Narration/teacher text: "If you're a mathematician, there are about 10 people on Earth who understand what you do, and none of them have the power to fire you. You have no set hours, everyone respects you, and you work about 5/8ths of the year. If you go to a bar and tell a woman you are employed for your intellect alone, she will probably sleep with you. But hey, feel free not to do your homework. It's not my problem."
Votey:
Two people, one bespectacled person leaning in and a younger person writing/drawing at a desk.
Bespectacled person: "Wow, you'll go through a lot to avoid drawing a background."
Younger person: "Hooh yeah."
Alt text
A two-panel SMBC comic contrasting teaching styles. The first panel, labeled WRONG APPROACH, shows a red-haired teacher gesturing at a chalkboard reading '2 = 3x² + 1' while telling seated students, 'Kids! Math is fun! It's like a safari to find the value of x.' The second panel, labeled RIGHT APPROACH, is a dense block of text in which a teacher pitches the perks of being a mathematician: about 10 people on Earth understand your work and none can fire you, no set hours, universal respect, you work about 5/8ths of the year, and if you tell a woman at a bar you're employed for your intellect alone she'll probably sleep with you, ending with 'But hey, feel free not to do your homework. It's not my problem.' In the votey aftercomic, a bespectacled person leans over someone drawing at a desk and says, 'Wow, you'll go through a lot to avoid drawing a background,' and the artist replies, 'Hooh yeah' — a self-aware joke that the wall-of-text second panel let the cartoonist skip drawing a background.
Transcribed by Claude Opus 4.8.