recreation
Original: recreation on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Transcript
Panel 1:
Man with red hair: Why do you think people are becoming less and less likely to participate in local community groups?
Panel 2:
Man in red shirt (with glasses): Rise of rationality, power of capital over labor, the bureaucratization of
Panel 3:
Man in red shirt (continuing): behavior, the welfare state, globalization... it's complicated.
Panel 4:
Man with red hair: Yeah.
Man in red shirt: Nah, I'm just kidding. This graph explains it all.
Graph below the panels:
Title/axes: Y-axis labeled "ENTERTAINMENT VALUE", X-axis labeled "TIME".
A flat red horizontal line labeled "MEETING YOUR NEIGHBORS".
A steeply rising blue curve labeled "VIDEO GAMES".
Votey:
The same graph, zoomed in. A handwritten label "Zelda III" with an arrow points to the spot where the rising blue "video games" curve crosses above the flat red "meeting your neighbors" line.
Man with red hair: Why do you think people are becoming less and less likely to participate in local community groups?
Panel 2:
Man in red shirt (with glasses): Rise of rationality, power of capital over labor, the bureaucratization of
Panel 3:
Man in red shirt (continuing): behavior, the welfare state, globalization... it's complicated.
Panel 4:
Man with red hair: Yeah.
Man in red shirt: Nah, I'm just kidding. This graph explains it all.
Graph below the panels:
Title/axes: Y-axis labeled "ENTERTAINMENT VALUE", X-axis labeled "TIME".
A flat red horizontal line labeled "MEETING YOUR NEIGHBORS".
A steeply rising blue curve labeled "VIDEO GAMES".
Votey:
The same graph, zoomed in. A handwritten label "Zelda III" with an arrow points to the spot where the rising blue "video games" curve crosses above the flat red "meeting your neighbors" line.
Alt text
A four-panel SMBC comic followed by a graph. In the panels, a red-haired man asks a bespectacled man in a red shirt why people are becoming less likely to participate in local community groups. The man launches into a long-winded academic answer ("Rise of rationality, power of capital over labor, the bureaucratization of behavior, the welfare state, globalization... it's complicated"), then grins and says, "Nah, I'm just kidding. This graph explains it all." Below is a hand-drawn line graph with "Entertainment Value" on the Y-axis and "Time" on the X-axis. A flat red line labeled "Meeting Your Neighbors" stays low and constant, while a blue curve labeled "Video Games" starts low and rises steeply, overtaking it. The votey (bonus panel) zooms into the graph and labels the exact crossover point where video games surpass meeting your neighbors with a handwritten arrow reading "Zelda III" — joking that the decline of community involvement began the moment video games became more fun than socializing.
Transcribed by Claude Opus 4.8.